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LONDON

REV. C. H. DA VIES, D.D.

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MYSTIC LONDON;

OR,

PHASES OF OCCULT LIFE IN THE
BRITISH METROPOLIS.

BY

REV. CHARLES MAURICE DAVIES, D.D.

AUTHOR OF
"orthodox" and "unorthodox LONDON," ETC

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in thy philosophy."

Hamlet.

DEC 17 1884

NEW YORK:
JOHN W. LOYELL, G

14 & 13 Vesey Street

TROWS

PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY,

NEW YORK.

CONTENTS

CHAP. PAGE.

I. London Arabs i

II. East London Arg,bs 9

III. London Arabs in Canada 16

IV. Waifs and Strays 23

V. A Lunatic Ball 31

VI. A Baby Show 41

VII. A Night in a Bakehouse 47

VIII. A London Slave Market 54

IX. Tea and Experience 59

X. Sunday Linnet-singing 69

XI. A Woman's Rights Debate 74

XII. An Open-Air Tichborne Meeting 8t

XIII. Sunday in a People's Garden 88

XIV. Utilizing the Young Ladies . 94

XV. Fairlop Friday 99

XVI. A Christmas Dip 105

XVII. Boxing-day on the Streets 109

XVIIL The Vigil of the Derby 114

XIX. The Wifeslayer's "Home" 122

XX. Bathing in the Far East 127

XXI. Among the Quakers 132

XXII. Penny Readings 139

XXIII. Darwinism on the Devil 145

XXIV Peculiar People .161

XXV. Interviewing an Astrologer 165

XXVL A Barmaid Show 172

XXVII. A Private Execution 176

XXVIII. Breaking up for the Holidays 182

iv CONTENTS.

XXIX. Psychological Ladies 185

XXX. Secularism on Bunyan . , , i8q

XXXI. Al Fresco Infidelity ......;... 196

XXXII. An ''Indescribable Phenomenon" 203

XXXIII. A Lady Mesmerist . 211

XXXIV. A Psychopathic Institution 218

XXXV. A Phrenological Evening 225

XXXVI. A Spiritual Picnic 230 j

XXXVII. A Ghostly Conference 235 f

XXXVIII. An Evening's Diablerie 243

XXXIX. Spiritual Athletes 249

XL. " Spotting " Spirit Mediums 254

XLI. A Seance for Skeptics 260

XLII. An Evening with the Higher Spirits 266

XLIII. Spirit Forms 276

XLIV. Sitting with a Sibyl 282

XLV. Spiritualists and Conjurers 288

XLVI. Pros and Cons of Spiritualism 294

MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER I.

LONDON ARABS.

OF all the protean forms of misery that meet us in
the bosom of that "stony-hearted, stepmother, Lon-
don," there is none that appeals so directly to our sym-
pathies as the spectacle of a destitute child. In the
case of the grown man or woman, sorrow and suffering
are often traceable to the faults, or at best to the misfor-
tunes of the sufferers themselves ; but in the case of
the child they are mostly, if not always, vicarious. The
fault, or desertion, or death of the natural protectors,
turns loose .upon the desert of our streets those nomade
hordes of Bedouins, male and female, whose presence
is being made especially palpable just now, and whose
reclamation is a perplexing, yet still a hopeful, problem.
In the case of the adult Arab, there is a life's work to
undo, and the facing of that fact it is which makes some
of our bravest workers drop their hands in despair.
With these young Arabs, on the contrary, it is only the
wrong basis of a few early years to correct, leaving carte
blanche for any amount of hope in youth, maturity, and
old age. Being desirous of forming, for my own edifica-
tion, some notion of the amount of the evil existing,
and the efforts made to counteract it, I planned a pil-

2 MYSTIC LONDON.

grimage into this Arabia Infelix — this Petrasa of the
London flagstones ; and purpose setting down here, in
brief, a few of my experiences, for the information of
stay-at-home travellers, and still more for the sake of
pointing out to such as may be disposed to aid in the
work of rescuing these little Arabs the proper channels
for their beneficence. Selecting, then, the Seven Dials
and Bethnal Green as the foci of my observation in
West and East London respectively, I set out for the
former one bleak March night, and by way of breaking
ground, applied to the first police-constable I met on
that undesirable beat for information as to my course.
After one or two failures, I met with an officer literally
" active and intelligent," who convoyed me through sev-
eral of that network of streets surrounding the Seven
Dials, leaving me to my own devices when he had given
me the general bearings of the district it v»rould be de-
sirable to visit.

My first raid was on the Ragged School and Soup
Kitchen in Charles Street, Drury Lane, an evil-looking
and unfragrant locality ; but the institution in question
stands so close to the main thoroughfare that the most
fastidious may visit it with ease. Here I found some
twenty Arabs assembled for evening school. They were
of all ages, from seven to fifteen, and their clothing was
in an inverse ratio to their diet — very little of the form-
er, and a great deal of the latter. They moved about
with their bare feet in the most feline way, like the veri-
table Bedouin himself. There they were, however, over
greasy slates and grimy copy-books, in process of civil-
ization. The master informed me that his special dif-
ficulties arose from the attractions of the theatre and the
occasional intrusion of wild Arabs, who came only to

LONDON ARABS. 3

kick up a row. At eight o'clock the boys were to be
regaled with a brass band practice, so, finding from one
of the assembled Arabs that there was a second insti-
tution of the kind in King Street, Long Acre, I passed
on thereto. Here I was fortunate enough to find the
presiding genius in the person of a young man engaged
in business during the day, and devoting his extra time
to the work of civilizing the barbarians of this district.
Sunday and week-day services, night schools. Bands of
Hope, temperance meetings, and last, not least, the soup
kitchen, were the means at work here. Not a single
officer is paid. The task is undertaken " all for love,
and nothing for reward," and it has thriven so far that
my presence interrupted a debate between the gentle-
man above-mentioned and one of his coadjutors on the
subject of taking larger premises. The expenses were
met by the weekly offerings, and I was surprised to see
by a notice posted in the room where the Sunday ser-
vices are held, that the sum total for the past week was
only iQi". 4^. So there must be considerable sacrifice
of something more than time to carry on this admirable
work. Under the guidance of the second gentleman
mentioned alijove, I proceeded to the St. George's and
St. Giles's Refuge in Great Queen Street, where boys
are admitted on their own application, the only qualifica-
tion being destitution. Here they are housed, clothed,
boarded, and taught such trades as they may be fitted
for, and not lost sight of until they are provided with
situations. A hundred and fifty-four was the number
of this truly miraculous draught from the great ocean
of London streets, whom I saw all comfortably bedded
in one spacious dormitory. Downstairs were the im-
plements and products of the day's work, dozens of

4 MYSTIC LONDON.

miniature cobblers' appliances, machines for sawing and
chopping firewood, &c., whilst, in a spacious refectory
on the first floor, I was informed, the resident Arabs
extended on a Friday their accustomed hospitality to
other tribes, to such an extent that the party number-
ed about 500. Besides the 154 who were fortunate
enough to secure beds, there were twenty new arrivals,
who had to be quartered on the floor for the night ; but
at all events they had a roof above them, and were out
of the cruel east wind that made Arabia Petraea that
evening an undesirable resting-place indeed. Lights
were put out, and doors closed, when I left, as this is
not a night refuge ; but notices are posted, I am inform-
ed, in the various casual wards and temporary refuges,
directing boys to this. There is a kindred institution
for girls in Broad Street. Such was my first experience
of the western portion of Arabia Infelix.

The following Sunday I visited the Mission Hall be-
longing to Bloomsbury Chapel, in Moor Street, Soho,
under the management of Mr. M'Cree, and the nature
of the work is much the same as that pursued at King
Street. The eleven o'clock service was on this partic-
ular day devoted to children, who were assembled in
large numbers, singing their cheerful hymns, and listen-
ing to a brief, practical amd taking address. These
children, however, were of a class above the Arab
type, being generally well dressed. I passed on thence
to what was. then Mr. Brock's chapel, where I found
my veritable Arabs, whom I had seen in bed the pre-
vious evening, arrayed in a decent suit of " sober liv-
ery," and perched up in a gallery to gather what they
could comprehend of Mr. Brock's discourse — not very
much, I should guess ; for that gentleman's long Latin-

LONDON ARABS. c

ized words would certainly fire a long wa.y over their
heads, high as was their position. I found the whole
contingent of children provided for at the refuge was
400, including those on board the training ship " Chi-
chester," and the farm at Bisley, near Woking, Surrey.
This is certainly the most complete way of dealing with
the Arabs par excellence, as it contemplates the case
of utter destitution and homelessness. It need scarce-
ly be said, however, that such a work must enlarge its
boundaries very much, in order to make any apprecia-
ble impression on the vast amount of such destitution.
Here, nevertheless, is the germ, and it is already fruc
tifying most successfully. The other institutions^ deal-
ing with larger masses of children, aim at civilizing
them at home, and so making each home a centre of
influence.

Passing back again to the King Street Mission Hall,
I found assembled there the band of fifty missionaries,
male and female, who visit every Sunday afternoon the
kitchens of. the various lodging-houses around the
Seven Dials. Six hundred kitchens are thus visited
every week. After roll-call, and a brief address, we
sallied forth, I myself accompanying Mr. Hatton — the
young man to whom the establishment of the mission is
due — and another of his missionaries. I had heard
much of the St. Giles's kitchens, but failed to realize
any idea of the human beings swarming by dozens and
scores in those subterranean regions. Had it not been
for the fact that nearly every man was smoking, the at-
mosphere would have been unbearable. In most of the
kitchens they were beguiling the ennui of Sunday after-
noon with cards ; but the game was invariably sus-
pended on our arrival. Some few removed their hats

6 MYSTIC LONDOiY.

— for all wore them — and a smaller number still joined
in a verse or two of a hymn, and listened to a portion
of Scripture and a few words of exhortation. One or
two seemed interested, others smiled sardonically ; the
majority kept a dogged silence. Some read their
papers and refused the tracts and publications offered
them. These, I found, were the Catholics. I was as-
sured there were many men there who themselves, or
whose friends, had occupied high positions. I was
much struck with the language of one crop-headed
young fellow of seventeen or eighteen, who, seeing me
grope my way, said, " They're not very lavish with the
gas here, sir, are they 1 " It may appear that this " ex-
perience " has but little bearing on the Arab boys ; but
really some of the inmates of these kitchens were but
boys. Those we visited were in the purlieus of the old
" Rookery," and for these dens, I was informed, the
men paid fourpence a night! Surely a little money in-
vested in decent dwellings for these people would be
well and even remuneratively spent. The kitchens,
my informant — who has spent many years among them
— added, are generally the turning point between hon-
esty and crime. The discharged soldier or mechanic
out of work is^ there herded with the professional thief
or burglar, and learns his trade and gets to like his
life.

The succeeding evening I devoted first of all to the
Girls' Refuge, 19 Broad Street, St. Giles's. Here were
sixty-two girls of the same class as the boys in Great
Queen street, who remain until provided with places as
domestic servants. A similar number were in the
Home at Ealing. The institution itself is the picture
of neatness and order. I dropped in quite unexpect-

LONDON ARABS. y

edly, and any visitor who may be induced to follow my
example will not fail to be struck with the happy,
'* homely " look of everything, the clean, cheerful ap-
pearance of the female Arabs, and the courtesy and
kindness of the matron. These girls are considered to
belong to St. Giles's parish, as the boys to Bloomsbury
Chapel. So far the good work has been done by the
Dissenters and Evangelical party in the Established
Church. The sphere of the High Church — -as I was
reminded by the Superintendent Sergeant — is the New-
port Market Refuge and Industrial Schools. Here, be-
sides the male and female refuges, is a Home for Des-
titute Boys, who are housed and taught on the same
plan as at St. Giles's. Their domicile is even more
cosy than the other, and might almost tempt a boy to
act the part of an " amateur Arab." I can only say
the game that was going on, previously to bed, in the
large covered play room, with bare feet and in shirt
sleeves, was enough to provoke the envy of any
member of a Dr. Blimber's " Establishment." The
Institution- had just had a windfall in the shape of
one of those agreeable ;^i,ooo cheques that have been
flying about latel}^, or their resources would have been
cramped ; but the managers are wisely sensible that
such windfalls do not come every day, and so forbear
enlarging their boundaries as they could wish.

Strangely enough, the Roman Catholics, who usually
outdo us in their work among the poor, seemed a little
behindhand in this special department of settling the
Arabs. They have schools largely attended in Tudor
Place, Tottenham Court Road, White Lion Street, Seven
Dials, &C.5 but, as far as I could ascertain, nothing lo-
cal in the shape of a Refuge. To propagate the faith

g MYSTIC LONDON.

may be all very well, and will be only the natural im-
pulse of a man sincere in his own belief j but we must
not forget that these Arabs have bodies as well as souls,
and that those bodies have been so shamefully debased
and neglected as to drag the higher energies down with
them ; and it is a great question whether it is not ab-
solutely necessary to begin on the very lowest plane
first, and so to work towards the higher. Through the
body and the mind we may at least reach the highest
sphere of all.

Without for one moment wishing to write down the
"religious" element, it is, I repeat, a grave question
whether the premature introduction of that element
does not sometimes act as a deterrent, and frustrate the
good that might otherwise be done. Still there is the
great fact, good is being done. It would be idle to
carp at any means when the end is so thoroughly good.
I could not help, as I passed from squalid kitchen to
kitchen that Sunday afternoon, feeling Lear's words
ring through my mind :—

'* O, I have ta'en
Too little care of this. Take physic, pomp,
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just."

And now " Eastward ho 1 " for " experiences " in
Bethnal Green.

EAST LONDON ARABS.

CHAPTER II.

EAST LONDON ARABS.

IVrOTWITHSTANDING my previous experiences
among the Western tribes of Bedouins whose lo-
cale is the Desert of the Seven Dials, I must confess to
considerable strangeness when first I penetrated the wil-
derness of Bethnal Green. Not only was it utterly terra
incognita to me, but, with their manifold features in
common, the want and squalor of the East have traits
distinct from those of the West. I had but the name
of one Bethnal Green parish and of one lady — Miss
Macpherson — and with these slender data I proceeded
to my work, the results of which I again chronicle
seriatim.

Passing from the Moorgate Street Station I made
for the Eas-tern Counties Terminus at Shoreditch, and
soon after passing it struck off to my right in the Beth-
nal Green Road. Here, amid a pervading atmosphere
of bird-fanciers and vendors of live pets in general, I
found a Mission Hall, belonging to I know not what
denomination, and, aided by a vigorous policeman,
kicked — in the absence of knocker or bell — at all the
doors, without result. Nobody was there. I went on
to the Bethnal Green parish which had been named to
me as the resort of nomade tribes, and found the in-
cumbent absent in the country for a week or so, and
the Scripture-reader afraid, in his absence, to give much
information. He ventured, however, to show me the

10 MYSTIC LONDON.

industrial school, where some forty children were em-
ployed in making match-boxes for Messrs. Bryant and
May. However, as I was told that the incumbent in
question objected very decidedly to refuges and ragged
schools, and thought it much better for the poor to
strain a point and send their little ones to school, I felt
that was hardly the regimen to suit my Arabian friends,
who were evidently teeming in that locahty. I was
even returning home with the view of getting further
geographical particulars of this Eastern Arabia Petraea,
when, as a last resource, I was directed to a refuge in
Commercial Street. I rang here, and found myself in
the presence of the veritable Miss Macpherson herself,
with whom I passed two pleasant and instructive
hours.

At starting, Miss Macpherson rather objected to be-
ing made the subject of an article — first of all, for the
very comprehensible reason that such publicity would
draw down upon her a host of visitors ; and when I
suggested that visitors probably meant funds, she
added a second, and not quite so comprehensible an
objection — that these funds themselves might alloy the
element of Faith in which the work had been so far
carried on. She had thoroughly imbibed the spirit of
Miiller, whose home at Bristol was professedly the out-
come of Faith and Prayer alone. However, on my
promise to publish only such particulars — name, local-
ity, &c. — as she might approve, this lady gave me the
details of her truly wonderful work. The building in
which I found her had been erected to serve as large
warehouses, and here no of the most veritable Arabs
were housed, fed, taught, and converted into Christians,
when so convertible. Should they prove impression-

EAST LONDOX ARABS. j i

able, Miss Macpherson then contemplates their emigra-
tion to Canada. Many had already been sent out ; and
her idea was to extend her operations in this respect ;
not, be it observed, to cast hundreds of the scum of the
East End of London upon Canada — a proceeding to
which the Canadians would very naturally object — but
to form a Home on that side to be fed from the Homes
on this, and so to remove from the old scenes of vice
and temptation those who had been previously trained
in the refuges here. She has it in contemplation to
take a large hotel in Canada, and convert it into an in-
stitution of this kind ; and I fancy it was the possibil-
ity that publicity might aid this larger scheme which
eventually induced the good lady to let the world so far
know what she is doing. At all events, she gave me
carte blanche to publish the results of my observations.

In selecting and dealing with the inmates of her ref-
uges, Miss Macpherson avails herself of the science of
phrenology, in which she believes, and she advances
good reason for so doing. I presume my phrenolog-
ical development must have been satisfactory, since
she not only laid aside her objection to publicity, but
even allowed me to carry off with me her MS. "case-
books," from which I cull one or two of several hun-
dred : —

'' I. T. S., aged ten (March 5, 1869). — An orphan.
Mother died in St. George's Workhouse. Father killed
by coming in contact with a diseased sheep, being a
slaughterman. A seller of boxes in the street. Slept
last in a bed before Christmas. Slept in haycarts, un-
der a tarpaulin. Says the prayers his mother ' teached
him.' "

"2. J. H., aged twelve (March 5). — No home but the

12 MYSTIC LONDON.

streets. Father killed by an engine-strap, being an
engineer. Mother died of a broken heart. Went into

Workhouse ; but ran away through ill-treatment

last December. Slept in ruins near Eastern Counties
Railway. Can't re7nember when he last lay in a bed."

"3. A. R., aged eleven (March 5). — Mother and
father left him and two brothers in an empty room in

H Street. Policeman, hearing them crying, broke

open the door and took them to the workhouse. His
two brothers died. Was moved from workhouse by
grandmother, and she, unable to support him, turned
him out on the streets. Slept in railway ruins ; lived
by begging. July 24, sent to Home No. i as a reward
for good conduct."

Besides thus rescuing hundreds of homeless ones,
Miss Macpherson has in many instances been the means
of restoring runaway children of respectable parents.
Here is an instance : —

"Feb. 25th. — S. W. T., aged fourteen, brought into
Refuge by one of the night teachers, who noticed him in
a lodging-house respectably dressed. Had walked up

to London from N , in company with two sailors

(disreputable men, whom the lodging-house keeper
declined to take in). Had been reading sensational

books. Wrote to address at N . Father telegraphed

to keep him. Uncle came for him with fresh clothes
and took him home. He had begun to pawn his clothes
for his night's lodgings. His father had been for a
fortnight in communication with the police."

The constables in the neighborhood all know Miss
Macpherson 's Refuge, and her readiness to take boys
in at any time ; so that many little vagrants are brought
thither by them and reclaimed, instead of being locked

EAST LONDON ARABS.

n

up and ijent to prison, to go from bad to worse. Besides
this receptacle for boys, Miss Macpherson has also a
Home at Hackney, where girls of the same class are
housed. The plan she adopts is to get a friend to be
responsible for one child. The cost she reckons at 6/.
loi". per annum for those under ten years, and lo/. for
those above.

But this excellent lady's good works are by no means
catalogued yet. Besides the children being fed and
taught in these Homes, the parents and children are
constantly gathered for sewing classes, tea meetings,
&c., at the Refuge. Above 400 children are thus
influenced ; and Miss Macpherson, with her coadjutors,
systematically visits the wretched dens and lodging-
houses into which no well-dressed person, unless favor-
ably known like her for her work among the children
would dare to set foot. I was also present when a
hearty meal of excellent soup and a large lump of bread
were given to between three and four hundred men,
chiefly dock laborers out of employ. It was a touch-
ing sight to notice the stolid apathy depicted on most of
the countenances, which looked unpleasantly like de-
spair. One of the men assured me that for every pack-
age that had to be unladen from the docks there were
ten pair of hands ready to do the work, where only one
could be employed. Many of the men, he assured me,
went for two, sometimes three, days without food : and
with the large majority of those assembled the meal
they were then taking .would represent the whole of
their subsistence for the twenty-four hours. After sup-
per a hymn was sung, and a few words spoken to them
by Miss Macpherson on the allegory of the Birds and
Flowers in the Sermon on the Mount ; and so they

14 MYSTIC LONDON.

sallied forth into the darkness of Arabia Petraea. I
mounted to the little boy's bedroom, where the tiniest
Arab)s of all were enjoying the luxury of a game, with
bare feet, before retiring. Miss Macpherson dragged a
mattress off one of the beds and threw it down in the
centre for them to tumble head-over-tail ; and, as she
truly said, it was difficult to recognize in those merry
shouts and happy faces any remains of the veriest repro-
bates of the London streets.

Let us hear Miss Macpherson herself speak. In a
published pamphlet, " Our Perishing Little Ones," she
says : "As to the present state of the mission, we simply
say ' Come and see.' It is impossible by words to give
an idea of the mass of 120,000 precious souls who live

on this one square mile My longing is to send

forth, so soon as the ice breaks, 500 of our poor street
boys, waifs and strays, that have been gathered in, to
the warm-hearted Canadian farmers. In the meantime,
who will help us to make outfits, and collect 5/. for each
little Arab, that there be no hindrance to the complement
being made up when the spring time is come .''.... La-
dies who are householders can aid us much in endeavors
to educate these homeless wanderers to habits of industry
by sending orders for their firewood — 4^-. per hundred
bundles, sent free eight miles from the city." And,
again, in Miss Macpherson's book called " The Little
Matchmakers," she says : " In this work of faith and
labor of love among the very lowest in our beloved
country, let us press on, looking for great things. Pre-
venting sin and crime is a much greater work than
curing it. There are still many things on my heart
requiring more pennies. As they come, we will go
forward."

1

EAST LONDON ARABS. ' 15

Miss Macpherson's motto is, " The Word first in all
things ; afterwards bread for this body." There are
some of us who would be inclined to reverse this process
— to feed the body and educate the mind — not altogether
neglecting spiritual culture, even at the earliest stage,
but leaving anything like definite religious schooling
until the poor mind and body were, so to say, acclima-
tized. It is, of course, much easier to sit still and theo-
rize and criticise than to do what these excellent people
have done and are doing to diminish this gigantic evil.
" By their fruits ye shall know them," is a criterion
based on authority that we are none of us inclined to
dispute. Miss Macpherson boasts — and a very proper
subject for boasting it is — that she belongs to no ism.
It is signihcant, however, that the Refuge bears, or
bore the name of the " Revival " Refuge, and the paper
which contained the earliest accounts of its working was
called the Revivalist., though now baptized with the
border title of the Christian. Amid such real work it
would be a pity to have the semblance of unreality, and
I dreaded to think of the possibility of its existing, when
little grimy hands were held out by boys volunteering
to say a text for my behoof. By far the most, favorite
one was "Jesus wept;" next came "God is love" —
each most appropriate ; but the sharp boy, a few years
older, won approval by a long and more doctrinal quo-
tation_, whilst several of these held out hands again when
asked whether, in the course of the day, they had felt
the efficacy of the text given on the previous evening,
" Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth ; keep Thou
the door of my lips." Such an experience would be a
sign of advanced spirituality in an adult. It is ungener-
ous to ask whether its manifestation in an Arab child

1 6 MYSTIC LONDON.

must not be an anticipation of what might be the normal
result of a few years' training ? May not this kind of
forcing explain the cases I saw quoted in the books — of
one boy who " felt like a fish out of water, and left the
same day of his own accord j " another who " climbed
out of a three-floor window and escaped ? "

However, here is the good work being done. Let us
not carp at the details, but help it on, unless we can do
better ourselves. One thing has been pre-eminently
forced in upon me during this brief examination of our
London Arabs — namely, that individuals work better
than communities amongst these people. -The work
done by the great establishments, whether of England,
Rome, or Protestant Dissent, is insignificant compared
with that carried out by persons laboring like Mr. Hut-
ton in Seven Dials and Miss Macpherson in White-
chapel, untrammelled by any particular system. The
want and sorrow and suffering are individual, and
need individual care, just as the Master of old worked
Himself, and sent His scripless missionaries singly forth
to labor for Him, as — on however incommensurate a
scale — they are still laboring East and West, amongst
our Lon(Jon Arabs.

CHAPTER in.

LONDON AR,ABS IN CANADA.

N the previous chapter an account was given of the
Arabs inhabiting that Vv^onderful " square mile " in
East London, w^hich has since grown to be so familiar

I

^g|

LONDON ARABS IN CANADA. 1 7

in men's mouths. The labors of Miss Macpherson to-
wards reclaiming these waifs and strays in her " Refuge
and Home of Industry, Commercial Street, Spitalfields,"
were described at some length, and allusion was at the
same time made to the views which that lady entertained
with regard to the exportation of those Arabs to Can-
ada after they should have undergone a previous pro-
bationary training in the " Home." A short time after-
wards it was my pleasing duty to witness the departure
of one hundred of these young boys from the St. Pancras
Station, en route for Canada ; and it now strikes me
that some account of the voyage out, in the shape of
excerpts from the letters of the devoted ladies who
themselves accompanied our Arabs across the Atlantic,
may prove interesting ; while, at the same time, a calcu-
lation of their probable success in their new life and
homes may not improbably stimulate those who cannot
give their time, to give at least their countenance, and
it may be, their material aid, to a scheme which recom-
mends itself to all our sympathies — the permanent re-
clamation of the little homeless wanderers of our London
streets.

The strange old rambling " Home " in Commercial
Street, built originally for warehouses, then used as a
cholera hospital, and now the Arab Refuge, presented
a strange appearance during the week before the depart-
ure of the chosen hundred. On the ground-floor were
the packages of the young passengers ; on the first floor
the " new clothes, shirts, and stockings, sent by kind
lady friends from all parts of the khigdom, trousers and
waistcoats made by the widows, and the boots and pilot
jackets made by the boys themselves." The dormitory
was the great store-closet for all the boy's bags filled

l8 MYSTIC LONDON.

with things needful on board ship ; and on the top floor,
we can well imagine, the last day was a peculiarly melan-
choly one. The work attendant upon the boys' last
meal at the Refuge was over, and there, in the long
narrow kitchen, stood the cook wiping away her tears
with her apron, and the six little waiting maids around
them, with the novel feeling of having nothing to do —
there, where so much cutting, buttering, and washing-up
had been the order of the day. When the summons
came to start, the police had great difficulty in clearing
a way for the boys to the vans through the surging mass
of East London poverty. Some of the little match-box
makers ran all the three miles from Commercial Street
to St. Pancras Station to see the very last of their boy-
friends.

Derby was the stopping-place on the journey to Liver-
pool, and the attention of passengers and guards was
arrested by this strange company gathering on the plat-
form at midnight and singing two of the favorite Refuge
hymns. Liverpool was reached at 4 a. m., and the boys
filed off in fours, with their canvas bags over their
shoulders, to the river side, where their wondering eyes
beheld the Peruvian, which was to bear them to their
new homes.

At this point. Miss Macpherson's sister — -who is carry-
ing on the work of the Refuge during that lady's absence
— wrote as follows : — " Could our Christian friends have
seen the joy that beamed in the faces of those hundred
lads from whom we have just parted — could they know
the misery, the awful precipice of crime and sin from
which they had been snatched — we are sure their hearts
would be drawn out in love for those little ones. If;
still supported," she continues, 'T hope to send out

I

LONDON ARABS IN CANADA. ic^

another party of fifty boys and fifty girls while my sister
remains in Canada, and shall be happy to forward the
name and history of a boy or girl to any kind friend
wishing to provide for a special case. In the broad fields
of that new country where the farmers are only too glad
to adopt healthy young boys or girls into their families,
hundreds of our perishing little ones may find a happy
home."

On Thursday, the 12th of May, the /*^/7/27/^;z dropped
down the river ; and, as the last batch of friends left her
when she passed out into the Channel, these one hun-
dred boys, with Miss Macpherson, leaned over the
bulwarks, singing the hymn, " Yes, we part, but not for
ever."

From Derry Miss Macpherson wrote under date May
13th: — "With the exception of two, all are on deck
now, as bright as larks : they have carried up poor Jack
Frost and Franks the runner. It is most touching to
see them wrap them up in their rugs. Michael Flinn,
the Shoreditch shoeblack, was up all night, caring for
the sick boys. Poor Mike ! He and I have exchanged
nods at the Eastern Counties Railway corner these five
years. It is a great joy to give him such a chance for
life."

The voyage out was prosperous enough, though there
were some contrary winds, and a good deal of sea-sick-
ness among the lads. The captain seems to have been
quite won by the self-denying kindness of the ladies, and
he lightened their hands by giving occupation to the
boys. Then came out the result of training at the
Refuge. Those who had been some time there showed
themselves amenable to discipline ; but the late arrivals
were more fractious, and diilRcult to manage. These

20 MYSTIC LONDON.

were the lads '' upon whom," as Miss Macpherson says,
" the street life had left sore marks." Even when only
nearing the American coast, this indomitable lady's
spirit is planning a second expedition. " As far as I
dare make plans, I should like to return, starting from
Montreal July i6th, reaching the Home July 27th, and
then return with another lot the second week in August.
This second lot must be lads who are now under influ-
ence, and who have been not less than six months in a
refuge." The finale to this second letter, written from
Canada, adds : " The boys, to a man, behaved splendid-
ly. The agent's heart is won. All have improved by
the voyage, and many are brown hearty-looking chaps
fit for any toil."

In the Montreal Herald, of May 27th, there is an
account of these boys after their arrival, which says : —
" Miss Macpherson is evidently a lady whose capacity
for organization and command is of the very highest
order ; for boys, in most hands, are not too easily man-
aged, but in hers they were as obedient as a company

of soldiers These boys will speedily be

placed in positions, where they will grow up respect-
able and respected members of society, with access to
the highest positions in the country freely open to them.

We hope that Miss Macpherson will

place all her boys advantageously, and will bring us
many more. She is a benefactor to the Empire in both
hemispheres."

The importance of this testimony can scarcely be
overrated, since many persons hold themselves aloof
from a work of this nature through a feeling that it is
not fair to draft our Arab population on a colony. It
will be seen, however, that it is not proposed to export

LONDON ARABS IN CANADA. 21

these boys until they shall have been brought well under
influence, and so have got rid of what Miss Macpherson
so graphically terms the " sore marks of their street life."

Apropos of this subject, it may not be irrelevant to
quote a communication which has been received from
Sir John Young, the Governor-General of Canada,
dated Ottawa, May 3d, 1870 : — " For emigrants able
and wdlling to work, Canada offers at present a very
good prospect. The demand for agricultural laborers
in Ontario during the present year is estimated at from
30,000 to 40,000 ; and an industrious man may expect
to make about one dollar a day throughout the year, if
he is willing to turn his hand to clearing land, thresh-
ing, &c., during the winter. But it is of no use for
emigrants to come here unless they make up their
minds to take w^hatever employment offers itself most
readily, without making difficulties because it is not
that to which they have been accustomed, or which
they prefer."

I visited the Refuge and Home of Industry a few
nights afterwards, and, though Miss Macpherson was
absent, found all in working order. Sixty-three boys
were then its occupants. The superintendent was
anxiously looking forward to be able to carry out the
plan of despatching fifty boys and fifty girls during the
ensuing summer. The sum required for an East End
case is ^5; for a special case, £\o. The following
are specimens of about sixty cases of boys whom she
would like to send out, knowing that in Canada they
could readily obtain places : —

P. E., aged seventeen. — Mother died of fever, leaving
seven children ; father a dock laborer, but cannot get
full employment.

2 2 MYSTIC LONDON.

L. J., aged thirteen.— Mother dead ; does not know
where her father is ; has been getting her living by
singing songs in the lodging-houses ; is much improved
by her stay in the Home, and will make a tidy little
maid. This is just one of the many who might thus
be rescued from a life of sin and misery.

Returning home through the squalid streets that
night, where squatters were vending old shoes and
boots that seemed scarcely worth picking out of the
kennel, and garments that appeared beneath the notice
of the rag merchant, I saw the little Bedouins still in
full force, just as though no effort had been made for
their reclamation and housing. As they crowded the
doorsteps, huddled in the gutters, or vended boxes of
lights and solicited the honor of shining " your boots,
sir," I could not help picturing them crossing the sea,
under kindly auspices, to the " better land " beyond, and
anon, in the broad Canadian fields or busy Canadian
towns, growing into respectable farmers and citizens ;
and straightway each 1 ittle grimed, wan face seemed to
bear a new interest for me, and look wistfully up into
mine with a sort of rightful demand on my charity,
saying to me, and through me to my many readers,
" Come and help us ! ''

After the foregoing was written, a further letter ar-
rived from Miss Macpherson. All the boys were well
placed. The agent at Quebec wished to take the
whole hundred in a lump, but only ten were conceded to
him. At Montreal, too, all would have been taken, but
twenty-one only were left. All found excellent situa-
tions, many as house servants at ;^io and ^^15 a year.
Eight were in like manner left at Belleville, half way
between Montreal and Toronto. Sixtv were taken on

WAIFS AND STRAYS. 23

to Toronto ; and here we are told " the platform v.-as
crowded with farmers anxious to engage them all at
once. It was difficult to get them to the office." A
gentleman arrived from Hamilton, saying that sixty ap-
plications had been sent in for boys, directly it was
known Miss Macpherson was coming out. So there is
no need of anticipating anything like repugnance on
the part of the Canadians to the reception of our super-
fluous Arabs,

CHAPTER IV.

WAIFS AND STRAYS.

A MONG the various qualifications for the festivities
''^ of Christmastide and New Year, there is one
\^•hich is, perhaps, not so generally recognized as it
might be. Some of us are welcomed to the bright
fireside or the groaning table on the score of our social
and conversational qualities. At many and many a
cheery board, poverty is the only stipulation that is
made. I mean not now that the guests shall occupy
the unenviable position of " poor relations," but, in the
large-hearted charity that so widely prevails at that fes-
tive season, the need of a dinner is being generally ac-
cepted as a title to that staple requirement of existence.
Neither of these, however, is the distinction required in
order to entitle those who bear it to the hospitality of
Mr. Edward Wright, better known under the abbrevi-
ated title of " Ned," and without the prefatory " Mr."
That one social quality, without v/hich a seat at Ned

24 MYSTIC LONDON.

Wright's festive board cannot be compassed, is Felony.
A little, rakish-looking green ticket was circulated a few
days previously among the members of Mr. Wright's
former fraternity, bidding them to a " Great Supper " in
St. John's Chapel, Penrose Street (late West Street),
Walworth, got up under the auspices of the South-East
London Mission. The invitation ran as follows: —

" This ticket is only available for a male person who
has been convicted once for felony, and is not transfer-
able. We purpose providing a good supper of bread
and soup, after which an address will be given. At
the close of the meeting a parcel of provisions will be
given to each man. Supper will be provided in the
lower part of the chapel. Boys not admitted this
time. — Your friend, for Christ's sake,

" Ned Wright."

Why juvenile felons should be excluded " this time,"
and whether the fact of having been convicted more
than once would confer any additional privileges, did
not appear at first sight. So it was, however ; adult
felonious Walworth was bidden to the supper, and to
the supper it came. Among the attractions held out to
spectators of the proceedings was the announcement
that a magistrate was to take part in them — a fact that
possibly was not made generally known among the guests,
in whose regard it is very questionable whether the pres-
ence of the dreaded " beak " might not have proved
the reverse of a " draw." However, they came, pos-
sibly in happy ignorance of the potentate who was
awaiting them, and than whom there is one only crea-
tion of civilized life considered by the London cadger
his more natural enemy, that is the policeman.

Six o'clock was the hour appointed for the repast,

JVAIFS AND STRAYS. 25

and there was no need for the wanderer in Walworth
Road to inquire which was Penrose Street. Little groups
of shambling fellows hulked about the coiner waiting
for some one to lead the way to the unaccustomed chap-
el. Group after group, however, melted away into the
dingy building where Ned was ready to \velcome them.
With him I found, not one magistrate, but two ; one the
expected magnate from the country, the other a w^ell-
known occupant of the London bench, with whom, I
fancy, many of the guest3 could boast a previous ac-
quaintance of a character the reverse of desirable. Pen-
rose Street Chapel had been formerly occupied by the
Unitarians, but was then taken permanently by Ned
Wright at a rental of between 60/. and 70/. per annum,
and formed the third of his " centres," the others be-
ing under a railway arch in the New Kent Road, and
the Mission Hall, Deptford. As row by row filled with
squalid occupants, I could but scan from my vantage-
ground in the gallery the various physiognomies. I am
bound to say the typical gaol-bird was but feebly repre-
sented. The visitors looked like hard-working men — a
■ little pinched and hungry, perhaps, and in many cases
obviously dejected and ashamed of the qualification
which gave them their seat. One or t-wo, mostly of the
younger, came in with a swagger and a rough joke ; but
Ned and his guests knew one another, and he quickly
removed the lively young gentleman to a quiet corner
out of harm's way. A fringe of, spectators, mostly
female, occupied the front seat in the gallery when pro-
ceedings commenced, which they did wdth a hymn, com-
posed by Ned Wright himself. The ladies' voices proved
very useful in this respect ; but most of the men took
the printed copies of the hymns, which were handed

26 MYS TIC L OND ON:

round, and looked as if the}^ could read them, not a few
proving they could by singing full-voiced. After the
hymn, Wright announced that he had ordered eighty
gallons of soup — some facetious gentleman suggesting,
" That's about a gallon a-piece " — and he hoped all
would get enough. Probably about loo guests had
by this time assembled, and each was provided with a
white basin, which was filled by Ned and his assistants,
with soup from a washing jug. A paper bag contain-
ing half a quartern loaf was aj^o given to each, and the
contents rapidly disappeared. As the fragrant steam
mounted provokingly from the soup-basins up to the
gallery, Mr. Wright took occasion to mention that at the
last supper Mr. Clark, of the New Cut, furnished the
soup gratuitously — a fact which he thought deserved to
be placed on record.

In the intervals of the banquet, the host informed me
that he had already witnessed forty genuine " conver-
sions " as the results of these gatherings. He had, as
usual, to contend with certain obtrusive gentlemen who
" assumed the virtue " of felony, " though they had it not,"
and were summarily dismissed with the assurance that
he " didn't want no tramps." One mysterious young
man came in and sat down on a front row, but did not
remain two minutes before a thought seemed to strike
him, and he beat a hasty retreat. Whether he was pos-
sessed with the idea I had to combat on a previous
occasion of the same kind, that I was a policeman, I
cannot tell, but he never reappeared. I hope I was not
the innocent cause of his losing his supper. The only
" felonious " trait I observed was a furtive glance every
now and then cast around, and especially up to the gal-
lery. Beyond this there really was little to distinguish

IVAIFS AND STRA YS.

27

the gathering from a meeting of artisans a httle bit
"down on their luck," or out on strike, or under some
cloud of that sort.

As supper progressed, the number of spectators in
the gallery increased; and, with all due deference
to Ned Wright's good intentions, it may be open to
question whether this presence of spectators in the gal-
lery is wise. It gives a sort of spurious dash and bra-
vado to the calling of a felon to be supping in public,
and have ladies looking on, just like the " swells " at a
public dinner. I am sure some of the younger men
felt this, and swaggered through their supper accordingly.
There certainly was not a symptom of shame on the
face of a single guest, or any evidences of dejection*
when once the pea-soup had done its work. Some of
the very lively gentlemen in the front row even devoted
themselves to making critical remarks on the occupants
of the gallery. As a rule, and considering the antece-
dents of the men, the assembly was an orderly one ;
and would, I think, have been more so, but for the pres-
ence of the fair sex in the upper regions, many of whom,
it is but justice to say, were enjoying the small talk of
certain oily-haired young missionaries, and quite uncon-
scious of being the objects of admiring glances from
below.

Supper took exactly an hour, and .then came another
hymn, Ned Wright telling his guests that the tune was
somewhat difficult, but that the gallery would sing it for
them first, and then they would be able to do it for
themselves. Decidedly, Mr. Wright is getting " aesthe-
tic." This hymn was, in fact, monopolized by the gal-
lery, the men listening and evidently occupied in digest-
ing their supper. One would rather have heard some

28 MYSTIC LONDON.

thing in which they could join. However, it was a lively
march-tune, and they evidently liked it, and kept time
to it with their feet, after the custom of the gods on
Boxing Night. At this point Ned and five others
mounted the little railed platform, Bible in hand, and
the host read what he termed " a portion out of the
Good Old Book," choosing appropriately Luke xv.,
which tells of the joy among angels over one sinner that
repenteth, and the exquisite allegory of the Prodigal
Son, which Ned read with a good deal of genuine pathos.
It reminded him, he said, of old times. He himself
was one of the first prisoners at Wadsworth when " old
Brixton " was shut up. He had " done " three calen-
dar months, and when he came out he saw an old grey-
headed man, with a bundle. "That," said Ned, "was
my godly old father, and the bundle was new clothes in
place of my old rags."

The country magistrate then came forward, and drew
an ironical contrast between the " respectable " people
in the gallery and the " thieves " down below. " God
says we have all ' robbed him.' All are equal in God's
sight. But some of us are pardoned thieves." At this
point the discourse became theological, and fired over
the heads of the people down below. They listened
much as they listen to a magisterial remark from the
bench; but it was not their own language, such as Ned
speaks. It was the " beak," not the old " pal." It was
not their vernacular. It did for the gallery — interested
the ladies and the missionaries vastly, but not the thieves.
It was wonderful that they bore it as well as they did.
The magisterial dignity evidently overawed them ; but
they soon got used to it, and yawned or sat listlessly.
Some leant their heads on the rail in front and slept.

WAIFS AND STRA YS. 20

The latest arrivals left earliest. They had come to sup-
per, not to sermon.

Another of Ned Wright's hymns was then sung — Mr.
^Yright's muse having been apparently prolific in the
past year, no less than six hymns on the list being writ-
ten by himself during those twelve months. It is much
to be hoped that these poetical and aesthetical proclivities
will not deaden his practical energies. This hymn was
pitched distressingly high, and above the jDOwers of all
but the " gallery " and a very few indeed of the guests ;
but most of them put in a final " Glory, Hallelujah," at
the end of each stanza. Mr. Wright's tunes are bright
and cheerful in the extreme, without being vulgar or
offensively secular.

j The host himself then spoke a few words on the moral
I of the Sermon on the Mount : " Seek ye first the king-
dom of God and His righteousness." He claimed many
of those before him as old pals who had "drunk out of
the same pot and shuffled the same pack of cards," and
jcontrasted his present state with theirs. Then they
listened, open-mouthed and eager-eyed, though they had
been sitting two full hours. He pictured the life of
I Christ, and His love for poor men. " Christ died for
you," he said, "as well as for the 'big people.' Who is
that on the cross beside the son of God t " he asked in
an eloquent apostrophe. " It is a thief. Come to
Christ, and say, ' I've no character. I'm branded as a
felon. I'm hunted about the streets of London.' He
will accept you," He drew a vivid picture of the num-
ber of friends he had when he rowed for Dogget's Coat
and Badge. He met with an accident midway ; " and
when I got to the Swan at Chelsea," he said, " I had no
friends left. I was a losinsf man. Christ will never

30 MYSTIC LONDON.

treat you like that. He has never let me want in the
nine years since I have been converted." After a
prayer the assembly broke up, only those being request-
ed to remain who required advice. The prayer was
characteristic, being interspersed with groans from the
gallery ; and then a paper bag, containing bread and
cakes, was given to each, Ned observing, "There, thej
devil don't give you that. He gives you toke and
skilly." Being desired to go quietly, one gentleman j
expressed a hope that there was no policeman ; another
adding, "We don't want to get lagged." Ned had to
reassure them on my score once more, and then nearly
all disappeared — some ingenious guests managing to gett
two and three bags by going out and coming in again,,
until some one in the gallery meanly peached !

Only some half-dozen out of the hundred remained
and Ned Wright kneeling at one of the benches prayed
fervently, and entered into conversation with them one
by one. Two or three others dropped in, and there was^j
much praying and groaning, but evidently much sin
cerity. And so with at least some new impressions forj
good, some cheering hopeful words to take them on inn
the New Year, those few waifs and strays passed out into;)
the darkness, to retain, let it be hoped, some at least ofl
the better influences which were brought to bear uponj
them in that brighter epoch in their darkened lives
when Ned Wright's invitation gathered them to the^3
Thieves' Supper.

> J

A LJNATIC BALL. 3,

CHAPTER V.

LUNATIC BALL

/^NE half of the world believes the other half to be
^-^ mad ; and who shall decide which moiety is right,
the reputed lunatics or the supposed sane, since neither
party can be unprejudiced in the matter ? At present
the minority believe that it is a mere matter of numbers,
and that if intellect carried the day, and right were not
overborne by might, the position of parties would be
exactly reversed. The dilemma forced itself strongly
on my consciousness for a solution when I attended the
annual ball at Hanwell Lunatic Asylum. The prevail-
ing opinion inside the walls was that the majority of
madmen lay outside, and that the most hopelessly
insane people in all the world were the officers immedi-
ately concerned in the management of the establishment
itself.

It was a damp muggy January evening when I jour-
neyed to this suburban retreat. It rained dismally, and
the wind nearly blew the porter out of his lodge as he
obeyed our summons at the Dantesque portal of the
institution, in passing behind which so many had liter-
ally abandoned hope. I tried to fancy how it would
feel if one were really being consigned to that recepta-
cle by interested relatives, as we read in three-volume
novels j but it was no use. I* was one of a merry com-
pany on that occasion. The officials of Hanwell Asy-
lum had been a little shy of being handed down to fame ;

22 MYSTIC LONDON. :

so I adopted the ruse of getting into Herr Gustav
Kiister's corps of fiddlers for the occasion. However,
I must in fairness add that the committee during the
evening withdrew the taboo they had formerly placed
on my writing. I was free to immortalize them ; and
my fiddling was thenceforth a work of supererogation.

High jinks commenced at the early hour of six ; and
long before that time we had deposited our instruments
in the Bazaar, as the ball-room is somewhat incon-
gruously called, and were threading the Daedalean
mazes of the wards. Life in the wards struck me as
being very like living in a passage ; but when that
preliminary objection was got over, the long corridors
looked comfortable enough. They were painted in
bright warm colors, and a correspondingly genial tem-
perature was secured by hot-water pipes running the
entire length. Comfortable rooms opened out from
the wards at frequent intervals, and there was every
form of amusement to beguile the otherwise irksome
leisure of those temporary recluses. Most of my her-
mits were smoking — I mean on the male side^many
were reading; one had a fiddle, and I scraped acquaint-
ance immediately with him ; whilst another was seated
at the door of his snug little bedroom, getting up
cadenzas on the ilute. He was an old trombone-
player in one of the household regiments, an inmate
of Hanwell for thirty years, and a fellow bandsman
with myself for the evening. He looked, I thought,
quite as sane as myself, and played magnificently ; but
I was informed by the possibly prejudiced ofiicials that
he had his occasional weaknesses. A second member
of Herr Kiister's band whom I found in durance was a
clarionet player, formerly in the band of the Second

A LUNATIC BALL. 33

Life Guards ; and this poor fellow, who was an excel-
lent musician too, felt his position acutely. He apolo-
jgized sotto voce for sitting down with me in corduroys,
as well as for being an " imbecile." He did not seem
!to question the justice of the verdict against him, and
I had not become acclimatized to the atmosphere like the
old trombone player.

That New Year's night— for January was very young
— the wards, especially on the women's side, were gaily
decorated with paper flowers, and all looked as cheerful
and happy as though no shadow ever fell across the
threshold ; but, alas, there were every now and then
padded rooms opening out of the passage ; and as this
was not a refractory ward, I asked the meaning of the
arrangement, which I had imagined was an obsolete
one. I was told they were for epileptic patients. In
virtue of his official position as bandmaster, Herr
Kiister had a key ; and, after walking serenely into a
passage precisely like the rest, informed me, with the
utmost coolness, that I was in the refractory ward. I
looked around for the stalwart attendant, who is gener-
ally to be seen on duty, and to my dismay found he
was quite at the other end of an exceedingly long
corridor. I do not know that I am particularly nervous,
but I candidly confess to an anxiety to get near that
worthy official. We were only three outsiders, and the
company looked mischievous. One gentleman was
walking violently up and down, turning up his coat
sleeves, as though bent on our instant demolition.
I Another, an old grey-bearded man, came up, and
I fiercely demanded if I were a Freemason. I was
afraid he might resent my saying I was not, when it
happily occurred to me that the third in our party, an

34 MYSTIC LONDON.

amateur contra-bassist, was of the craft. I told oui
friend so. He demanded the sign, was satisfied, and,
in the twinkling of an eye, our double-bass friend was
struggling in his fraternal embrace. The warder, mis-
taking the character of the hug, hastened to the rescue,
and I was at ease.

We then passed to the ball-room, where my musical
friends were beginning to " tune up," and waiting foi
their conductor. The large room was gaily decorated,
and filled with some three or four hundred patients,
arranged Spurgeon-wise : the ladies on one side, and
the gentlemen on the other. There was a somewhat
rakish air about the gathering, due to the fact of the
male portion not being in full dress, but arrayed in
free-and-easy costume of corduroys and felt boots.
The frequent warders in their dark blue uniforms lent
quite a military air to the scene ; and on the ladies'
side the costumes were more picturesque ; some little
latitude was allowed to feminine taste, and the result
was that a large portion of the patients were gorgeous
in pink gowns. One old lady, who claimed to be a
scion of royalty, had a resplendent mob-cap ; but the
belles of the ball-room were decidedly to be found
among the female attendants, who were bright, fresh-
looking young women, in a neat, black uniform, with
perky little caps, and bunches of keys hanging at their
side like the rosary of a soeur de charite, or the chate- i
laines with which young ladies love to adorn themselves i
at present. Files of patients kept streaming into the I
already crowded room, and one gentleman, reversing ;
the order assigned to him by nature, walked gravely in
on the palms of his hands, with his legs elevated in the |
air. He had been a clown at a theatre, and still re- *

A LUNATIC BALL.

35

tained some of the proclivities of the boards. A wizen-
faced man, who seemed to have no name beyond the
conventional one of " Billy," strutted in with huge
' paper collars, like the corner man in a nigger troupe,
I and a tin decoration on his breast the size of a cheese-
plate. He was insensible to the charms of Terpsichore,
except in the shape of an occasional/^ji' seul^ and labored
under the idea that his mission was to conduct the band,
which he occasionally did, to the discomfiture of Herr
Kiister, and the total destruction of gravity on the part
of the executants, so that Billy had to be displaced.
It was quite curious to notice the effect of the music on
some of the quieter patients. One or two, whose coun-
tenances really seemed to justify their incarceration,
absolutely hugged the foot of my music stand, and
would not allow me to hold my instrument for a moment
when I was not playing on it, so anxious were they to
express their admiration of me as an artist. " I used
to play that instrument afore I came here," said a
patient, with a squeeky voice, who for eleven 3^ears has
labored under the idea that his mother is coming to see
him on the morrow ; indeed, most of the little group
around the platform looked upon their temporary sojourn
at Hanwell as the only impediment to a bright career
in the musical world.

Proceedings commenced with the Caledonians, and
it was marvellous to notice the order, not to say grace
and refinement with which all these pauper lunatics went
through their parts in the " mazy." The rosy-faced at-
tendants formed partners for the men, and I saw a her-
culean warder gallantly leading along the' stout old lady
in the mob-cap. The larger number of the patients of
course were paired with their fellow-prisoners, and at

7^e MYSTIC LONDON.

the top of the room the officials danced with some oi
the swells. Yes, there were swells here, ball-room cox-
combs in fustian and felt. One in particular was
pointed out to me as an University graduate of high
family, and on my inquiring how such a man became
an inmate of a pauper asylum the official said, "You
see, sir, when the mind goes the income often goes too,
and the people become virtually paupers." Insanity is
a great leveller, true ; but I could not help picturing
that man's lucid intervals, and wondering whether his
friends might not do better for him. But there he is,
pirouetting away with the pretty female organist, the
chaplain standing by and smiling approval, and the
young doctors doing the polite to a few invited guests,
but not disdaining, every now and then, to take a turn
with a patient. Quadrilles and Lancers follow, but no
" round dances." A popular prejudice on the part of
the majority sets down such dances as too exciting for
the sensitive dancers. The graduate is excessively
irate at this, and rates the band soundly for not playing
a valse. Galops are played, but not danced; a com-
plicated movement termed a "Circassian circle" being
substituted in their place. " Three hours of square
dances are really too absurd," said the graduate to an
innocent second fiddle.

In the centre of the room all was gravity and deco-
rum, but the merriest dances went on in corners. An
Irish quadrille was played, and an unmistakable Paddy
regaled himself with a most beautiful jig. He got on
by himself for a figure or two, when, remembering, no
doubt, that " happiness was born a twin," he dived into
the throng, selected a white-headed old friend of some
sixty years, and impressed him with the idea of '^ pas

A LUNATIC BALL. 37

de deux. There they kept it up in a corner for the
whole of the quadrille, twirling imaginary shillelaghs,
and encouraging one another with that expressive Irish
interjection, which it is so impossible to put down on
paper. For an hour all went merry as the proverbial
marriage bell, and then there was an adjournment of the
male portion of the company to supper. The ladies re-
mained in the Bazaar and discussed oranges, with an
occasional dance to the pianoforte, as the band retired
for refreshment too, in one of the attendants' rooms. I
followed the company to their cupper room, as I had
come to see, not to eat. About four hundred sat down
in a large apartment, and there were, besides, sundry
snug supper-parties in smaller rooms. Each guest par-
took of an excellent repast of meat and vegetables, with
a sufficiency of beer and pipes to follow. The chap-
lain said a short grace before supper, and a patient, who
must have been a retired Methodist preacher, improved
upon the brief benediction by a long rambling " asking
of a blessing," to which nobody paid any attention.
Then I passed up and down the long rows with a
courteous official, who gave me little snatches of the
history of some of the patients. Here was an actor of
some note in his day ; there a barrister ; here again a
clergyman; here a tradesman recently "gone," "all
through the strikes, sir," he added. The shadow — that
most mysterious shadow of all — had chequered life's
sunshine in every one of these cases. Being as they
are they could not be in a better place. They have the
best advice they could get even were they — as some of
them claim to be — princes. If they can be cured, here
is the best chance. If not — well, there were the little
dead-house and the quiet cemetery lying out in th(5

38 MYSTIC LONDON.

moonlight, and waiting for them when, as poor mad-
dened Edgar Allen Poe wrote, the "fever called living,"
should be " over at last." But who talks of dying on
this one night in all the year when even that old free-
mason in the refractory ward was forgetting, after his
own peculiar fashion, the cruel injustice that kept him
out of his twelve thousand a year and title ? Universal
merriment is the rule to-night. Six or seven gentle-
men are on their legs at once making speeches, which
are listened to about as respectfully as the " toast of
the evening " at a public dinner. As many more are
singing inharmoniously different songs ; the fun is get-
ting fast and furious, perhaps a little too fast and furi-
ous, when a readjournment to the ball-room is pro-
posed, and readily acceded to, one hoary-headed old
flirt remarking to me as he went by, that he was going
to look for his sweetheart.

A long series of square dances followed, the graduate
waxing more and more fierce at each disappointment in
his anticipated valse, and Billy giving out every change
in the programme like a parish clerk, which functionary
he resembled in many respects. It was universally
agreed that this was the best party that had ever been
held in the asylum, just as the last baby is always the
finest in the family. Certainly the guests all enjoyed
themselves. The stalwart attendants danced more
than ever with a will, the rosy attendants were rosier
and nattier than before, if possible. The mob-cap went
whizzing about on the regal head of its owner down the
middle of tremendous country dances, hands across, set
to partners, and then down again as though it had
never tasted the anxieties of a throne, or learnt by bit-
ter experience the sorrows of exile. Even the aca-

A LUNAl'IC BALL. 3^

demical gentleman relaxed to the fair organist, though
he stuck up his hair stiffer than ever, and stamped his
felt boots again as he passed the unoffending double-
bass with curses both loud and deep on the subject of
square dances. At length came the inevitable " God
Save the Queen," which was played in one key by the
orchestra, and sung in a great many different ones by
the guests. It is no disrespect to Her Majesty to say
that the National Anthem was received with anything
but satisfaction. It was the signal that the "jinks "
were over, and that was quite enough to make it un-
popular. However, they sang lustily and with a good
courage, all except the old woman in the mob-cab, who
sat with a complacent smile as much as to say, " This is
as it should be, I appreciate the honor done to my royal
brothers and sisters."

This is the bright side of the picture j but it had its
sombre tints also. There were those in all the wards
who stood aloof from the merriment, and would have
none of the jinks. Lean-visaged men walked moodily
up and down the passages like caged wild beasts.
Their lucid interval was upon them, and they fretted at
the irksome restraint and degrading companionship. It
was a strange thought ; but I fancied they must have
longed for their mad fit as the drunkard longs for the
intoxicating draught, or the opium-eater for his delicious
narcotic to drown the idea of the present. There were
those in the ball-room itself who, if you approached them
with the proffered pinch of snuff, drove you from them
with curses. One fine, intellectual man, sat by the
window all the evening, writing rhapsodies of the most
extraordinary character, and fancying himself a poet.
Another wrapped round a thin piece of lath with paper,

4c MYSTIC LONDON.

and superscribed it with some strange liieroglyphics,
begging me to deliver it. All made arrangements for
their speedy departure from Hanwell, though many in
that heart-sick tone which spoke of long-deferred hope — •
hope never perhaps to be realized. Most painful sight of
all, there was one little girl there, a child of eleven or
twelve years — a child in a lunatic asylum ? Think of
that, parents, when you listen to the engaging nonsense
of your little ones — think of the child in Hanwell wards !
Remember how narrow a line separates innocence from
idiocy ; so narrow aline that the words were once synon-
ymous !

There was the infirmary full of occupants on that
merry New Year's night. Yonder poor patient being
wheeled in a chair to bed will not trouble his attendant
long. There is another being lifted on his pallet-bed,
and having a cup of cooling drink applied to his parch-
ed lips by the great loving hands of a warder who tends
him as gently as a woman. It seems almost a cruel
kindness to be trying to keep that poor body and soul
together.

Another hour, passed rapidly in the liberal hospitality
of this great institution, and silence had fallen on its
congregated thousands. It is a small town in itself, and
to a large extent self-dependent and self-governed. It
bakes and brews, and makes its gas ; and there is no
need of a Licensing Bill to keep its inhabitants sober
and steady. The method of doing that has been dis-
covered in nature's own law of kindness. Instead of
being chained and treated as wild beasts, the lunatics
are treated as unfortunate men and women, and every
effort is made to ameliorate, both physically and moral-
ly, their 3ad condition. Ilcnce the bright wards, the

A BABY SHOW. 41

buxom attendants, the frequent jinks. Even the chapel-
service has been brightened up for their behoof.

This was what I saw by entering as an amateur fiddler
Herr Kuster's band at Hanwell Asylum ; and as I ran
to catch the' last up-train — which I did as the saying is
by the skin of my teeth — I felt that I was a wiser, though
it may be a sadder man, for my evening's experiences
at the Lunatic Ball.

One question would keep recurring to my mind. It
has been said that if you stop your ears in a ball-room,
and then look at the people — reputed sane — skipping
about in the new valse or the last galop, you will ima-
gine they must be all lunatics. I did not stop my ears
that night, but I opened my eyes and saw hundreds of
my fellow-creatures, all with some strange delusions,
many with ferocious and vicious propensities, yet all
kept in order by a few warders, a handful of girls, and
all behaving as decorously as in a real ball-room. And
the question which would haunt me all the way home
was, which are the sane people, and which the lunatics ?

CHAPTER VI.

A BABY SHOW.

nPHERE is no doubt that at the present moment the
-"■ British baby is assuming a position amongst us of
unusual prominence and importance. That he should
be an institution is inevitable. That he grows upon
us Londoners at the rate of some steady five hundred
a week, the Registrar-General's statistics of the excess

42 MYSTIC LONDON.

of births over deaths prove beyond question. His
domestic importance and powers of revolutionizing a
household are facts of which every Paterfamilias is made,
from time to time, unpleasantly aware. But the British
baby is doing more than this just at present. He is
assuming a public position. Perhaps it is only the
faint index of the extension of women's rights to the
infantile condition of the sexes. Possibly our age is
destined to hear of Baby Suffrage, Baby's Property Pro-
tection, Baby's Rights and Wrongs in general. It is
beyond question that the British baby is putting itself
forward, and demanding to be heard — as, in fact, it
always had a habit of doing. Its name has been un-
pleasently mixed up with certain revelations at Brixton,
Camberwell, and Greenwich. Babies have come to be
farmed like taxes or turnpike gates. The arable in-
fants seem to gravitate towards the transpontine districts
south of the Thames. It will be an interesting task for
our Legislature to ascertain whether there is any actual
law to account for the transfer, as it inevitably will
have to do when the delicate choice is forced upon it
between justifiable infanticide, wholesale Hospices des
Enfants Trouves^ and possibly some kind of Japanese
"happy despatch" for high-minded infants who are
superior to the slow poison administered by injudicious
" farmers." At all events, one fact is certain, and we can
scarcely reiterate it too often — the British baby is be-
coming emphatic beyond anything we can recollect as
appertaining to the infantile days of the present genera-
tion. It is as though a ray of juvenile " swellishness," a
scintillation of hobbledehoyhood, were refracted upon
the long clothes or three-quarter clothes of immaturity.
For, if it is true — as we may tax our infantile expe-

A BABY SHOW. 43

riences to assure us — that '' farmed " infants were an
article unknown to husbandry in our golden age, it is
equally certain that the idea of the modern Baby Show
was one which, in that remote era, would not have
been tolerated „ Our mothers and grandmothers would
as soon have thought of sacrificing an innocent to
Moloch as to Mammon. What meant it then — to what
can it be due — to precocity on the part of the British
baby, or degeneracy on the part of the British parent
— that two Baby Shows were " on " nearly at the same
moment — one at Mr, Giovannelli's at Highbury Barn,
the other at Mr. Holland's Gardens, North Woolwich .?

Anxious to keep au courant with the times, even
when those times are chronicled by the rapid career of
the British baby — anxious also to blot out the idea of
the poor emaciated infants of Brixton, Camberwell, and
Greenwich, by bringing home to my experience the
opposite pole of infantile developement — I paid a visit,
and sixpence, at Highbury Barn when the Baby Show
opened. On entering Mr. Giovannelli's spacious hall,
consecrated on ordinary occasions to the Terpsichorean
art, I found it a veritable shrine of the Diva triformis.

Immediately on entering I was solicited to invest
extra coppers in a correct card, containing the names,
weights, and — not colors ; they were all of one color,
that of the ordinary human lobster — but weights, of
the various forms of Wackford Squeers under twelve
months, who were then and there assembled, like a lot
of little fat porkers. It was, in truth, a sight to whet
the appetite of an " annexed " Fiji Islander, or any
other carnivorous animal. My correct card specified
eighty " entries ;" but although the exhibition only
opened at two o'clock, and I was there within an hour

44 MYSTIC LONDON.

after, I found the numbers up to loo quite full. The
■ interesting juveniles were arranged within rails, draped
with pink calico, all arrayed in " gorgeous attire," and
most of them partaking of maternal sustenance. The
mammas — all respectable married women of the work-
ing class — seemed to consider the exhibition of their
offspring by no means ififra dig.., and were rather pleased
than otherwise to show you the legs and other points
of their adipose encumbrances, Several proposed that
I should test the weight, which I did tremulously, and felt
relieved when the infant Hercules was restored to its
natural protector. The prizes, which amounted in
the gross to between two and three hundred pounds,
were to be awarded in sums of lo/. and 5/., and some-
times in the shape of silver cups, on what principle I
am not quite clear ; but the decision was to rest with .
a jury of three medical men and two " matrons." If
simple adiposity, or the approximation of the human
form divine to that of the hippopotamus, be the standard
of excellence, there could be no doubt that a young
gentleman named Thomas Chaloner, numbered 48 in
the correct card, aged eight months, and weighing
33lbs., would be be facile princeps, a prognostication
of mine subsequently justified by the event. I must
confess to looking with awe, and returning every now
and then to look again, on this colossal child. At my
last visit some one asked on what it had been fed.
Shall I own that the demon of mischief prompted me
to supplement the inquiry by adding, " Oil cake, or
Thorley's Food for Cattle ?"

On the score, I suppose, of mere peculiarity, my own
attention — I frankly confess I am not a connoisseur —
was considerable engrossed by " two little Niggers."

A BABY S I/O IV. 45

No doubt the number afterwards swelled to the orthodox
" ten little Niggers." One was a jovial young" cuss"
of eleven months — weighted at 29lbs., and numbered 62
on the card. He was a clean-limbed young fellow, with a
head of hair like a furze-bush, and his mother was quite
untinted. I presume Paterfamilias was a fine colored
gentleman. The other representative of the sons of
Ham — John Charles Abdula, aged three months, weight
2 libs., and numbered 76 — was too immature to draw upon
my sympathies j since I freely acknowledge such
specimens are utterly devoid of interest for me until
their bones are of sufficient consistency to enable them to
sit upright and look about as a British baby should.
This particular infant had not a idea above culinary
considerations. He was a very Alderman in embryo
if there are any such things as colored Aldermen. Then
there were twdns — that inscrutable visitation of Provi-
dence, three brace of gemini. Triplets, in mercy to our
paternal feelings, Mr. Giovannelli spared us.

There was one noteworthy point about this particular
exhibition. The mothers, at all events, got a good tour
days' feed whilst their infantile furniture was " on view."
I heard, sotto voce, encomiums on the dinner of the
day confi.dingly exchanged between gushing young ma-
trons, and I myself witnessed the disappearance of a
decidedly comfortable tea, to say nothing of sundry pints
of porter discussed sub rosd and free of expense to such
as stood in need of sustenance ; and indeed a good many
seemed to stand in need of it. Small wonder, when the
mammas were so forcibly reminded by the highly-deve-
loped British baby that, in Byron's own words, " our life
is two-fold."

It is certainly passing, not from the sublime to the

^6 MYSTIC LONDON.

ridiculous, but vice versa, yet it is noting another tes-
timony to the growing importance of the British baby,
if one mentions the growth of creches, or day-nurseries
for working-men's children in the metropolis. Already
an institution in Paris, they have been recently intro-
duced into England, and must surely prove a boon to
the wives of our working men. What in the world does
become of the infants of poor women who are forced
to work all day for their maintenance ? Is it not a
miracle if something almost worse than "farming" —
death from negligence, fire, or bad nursing — does not
occur to them ? The good ladies who have founded,
and themselves work these creches are surely meeting
a confessed necessity. I paid a visit one day to 4, Bul-
strode Street, w^here one of these useful institutions was
in full work. I found forty little toddlers, some playing
about a comfortable day-nursery, others sleeping in tiny
cribs ranged in a double line along a spacious well-aired
sleeping-room ; some too young for this, rocked in cosy
cradles ; but all clean, safe, and happy. What needs it
to say whether the good ladies who tended them wore
the habit of St. Vincent de Paul, the poke-bonnet of the
Puseyite "sister," or the simple garb of unpretending
Protestantism .'' The thing is being done. The most
helpless of all our population — the children of the work-
ing poor — are being kept from the streets, kept from
harm, and trained up to habits of decency, at 4, Bul-
strode Street, Marylebone Lane. Any one can go and
see it for himself ; and if he does — if he sees, as I did,
the quiet, unostentatious work that is there being done
for the British baby, " all for love and nothing for re-
ward " — I shall be very much surprised if he does not

A NIGHT IN A BAKEHOUSE. 4y

confess that it is one of the best antidotes imaginable to
baby-farming, and a sight more decorous and dignified
than any Baby Show that could possibly be imagined.

CHAPTER VII.

A NIGHT IN A BAKEHOUSE.

A LARMED at the prospect of " a free breakfast
table " in a sense other than the ordinary one —
that is, a breakfast table which would be minus the
necessary accompaniment of bread, or the luxury of
French rolls — I resolved to make myself master, so far
as might be possible, of the pros and cons of the ques-
tion at issue between bakers and masters at the period
of the anticipated strike some years ago. I confess to
having greatly neglected the subjects of strikes. I had
attended a few meetings of the building operatives ; but
the subject w-as one in which I myself was not personally
interested. I am not likely to want to build a house,
and might manage my own little repairs while the strike
lasted. But I confess to a leaning for the staff of life.
There are sundry small mouths around me, too, of quite
disproportionate capacities in the way of bread and but
ter, to say nothing at all of biscuits, buns, and tartlets.
The possibility of having to provide for an impending
state of siege, then, was one that touched me immedia-
tely and vitally. Should I, before the dreaded event,
initiate the wife of my bosom in the mysteries of bread
baking? Should I commence forthwith a series of prac-
tical experiments within the limited confines of my

48 MYSTIC LONDON.

kitchen oven ? To j^revent the otherwise inevitable
heaviness and possible ropiness in my loaves of the
future, some such previous process would certainly have
to be adopted. But, then, in order to calculate the prob-
abilities of the crisis, an examination of the status in
quo was necessary. Having a habit of going to head-
quarters in such questions, I resolved to do so on the
present occasion ; so I took my hat, and, as Sam Slick
says, " I off an' out."

The actual head-quarters of the men I found to be at
the Pewter Platter, White Lion Street, Bishopsgate.
Thither I adjourned, and, after drinking the conven-
tional glass of bitter at the bar, asked for a baker. One
came forth from an inner chamber, looking sleepy, as
bakers always look. In the penetralia of the parlor
which he left I saw a group of floury comrades, the
prominent features of the gathering being depression and
bagatelle. By my comatose friend I was referred to the
Admiral Carter, in Bartholomew Close, where the men's
committee sat daily at four. The society in front of the
bar there was much more cheerful than that of the
Pew^ter Platter, and the bakers were discussing much
beer, of which they hospitably invited me to partake.
Still I learned little of their movements, save that they
were to a man resolved to abide by the now familiar
platform of work from four to four, higher wages, and
no Sunday bakings. These were the principal features
of the demands, the sack money and perquisites being
confessedly subsidiary. Nauseated as the public was
and is with strikes, there are certain classes of the com-
munity wnth whom it is disposed to sympathize ; and
certainly one of those classes is that of journeymen
bakers. Bread for breakfast we must have, and rolls

A NIGHT IN A BAKEHOUSE. 4g

we should like ; but we should also like to have these
commodities with as little nightwork as possible on the
part of those who produce them. The " Appeal to the
Public " put torth by the Strike Committee on the
evening of the day concerning which I write was, per-
haps, a trifle sensational ; but if there was any truth in
it, such a state of things demanded careful investigation
— especially if it was a fact that the baker slept upon the
board where the bread was made, and mingled his
sweat and tears with the ingredients of the staff of life.
Pardonably, I hope, I wished to eat bread without baker
for my breakfast ; but how could I probe this dreadful
problem ? I had it — by a visit to the bakehouse of my
own baker, if possible, during the hours of work.

So I set out afresh after supper, and was most oblig-
ingly received by the proprietor of what one may well
take as a typical West-end-shop — neither very large nor
very small — what is graphically termed a " snug " con-
cern with a good connection, doing, as the technical
phrase goes, from sixteen to twenty sacks a week. The
resources of this establishment were at once placed at
my disposal for the night. Now, the advantage of con-
ferring with this particular master was, that he was not
pig-headed on the one hand, nor unduly concessive, as
he deemed some of his fellow-tradesmen to be, on the
other. He did not consider a journeyman baker's berth
a bed of roses, or his remuneration likely to make him
a millionaire ; but neither did he lose sight of the fact
that certain hours must be devoted to work, and a limit
somewhere placed to wage, or the public must suffer
through the employer of labor by being forced to pay
higher prices. The staff of this particular establish-
ment consisted of four men at the following wages : A

d

50

MYSTIC LONDON.

foreman at 281. and a second hand at i<ds. a week, bolt
of whom were outsiders ; while, sleepxg on the prem-
ises, and at the time of my arrival, buried in the arms of
Morpheus, were a third hand, at i6i"., and a fourth, at
\2.s. Besides these wages they had certain perquisites,
such as bread, butter, sugar, flour, sack-money, yeast-
money, &c. ; and the master, moreover, took his ade
quate share of day-work. He was seated outside his
shop, enjoying the cool breezes, not of evening, but of
midnight, when I presented myself before his astonished
gaze. His wife and children had long since retired.
The foreman and second " hand " had not arrived \ the
third and fourth " hands " were, as I said, sweetly sleep-
ing, in a chamber on the basement, well out of range of
the bakehouse, to which, like a couple of conspirators,
we descended. It was not exactly the spot one would
have selected for a permanent residence if left free to
choose. It was, perhaps, as Mr. Dickens' theatrical
gentleman phrased it, pernicious snug ; but the ventila-
tion was satisfactory. There were two ovens, which
certainly kept the place at a temperature higher than
might have been agreeable on that hot September night.
Kneading troughs were ranged round the walls, and in
the centre, like an altar-tomb, was the fatal " board "
where, however, I sought in vain for the traces of per-
spiration or tears. All was scrupulously clean. In
common phrase, you might have " eaten your dinner "
off any portion of it.

Soon after midnight the outsiders turned in, first the
second hand and then the foreman, and, plunging into
the " Black Hole," made their toilettes du soir. Then
active operations commenced forthwith. In one com-
partment of the kneading-trough was the "sponge,"

A NIGHT IN A BAKEHOUSE. 51

which had been prepared by the foreman early in the
evening, and which now^, having properly settled, was
mixed with the flour for the first batch, and left to
"prove."' The process of making the dough occupied
until about one o'clock, and then followed two hours of
comparative tranquillity, during which the men adjourned
to the retirement of certain millers' sacks hard by, which
they rolled up cleverly into extempore beds, and seemed
to prefer to the board. The proving takes about two
hours, but varies with the temperature. If the dough is
left too long, a sour batch, or a " pitch in," is the result.
It is then cut out, weighed, and " handed up ; " after
which it stands while the dough for the second batch
is being made, and those fatal rolls, around which so
much of this contest is likely to turn, are being got for-
ward. It must be understood that I am here describ-
ing what took place in my typical bakehouse. Proceed-
ings will, of course, vary in details according to the
neighborhood, the season, and other circumstances.
This makes, as my informant suggested, the race of
bakers necessarily in some degree a varium atque muta-
bele genius, whom it is difficult to bind by rigid " hard
and fast *' lines. The first batch is in the oven at four,
and is drawn about 5.30. During the intervals there
has been the preparation of fancy bread and the "getting
off " of the rolls. Then the " cottage " batch is moulded
and got off, and comes out of the oven at eight. From
three o'clock up to this hour there has been active work
enough for everybody, and I felt myself considerably in
the way, adjourning ever and anon to the master's
snuggery above stairs to note down my experiences. As
for the men, they must have fancied that I was an es-
caped lunatic, with harmless eccentricities ; and the

^2 MYSTIC LONDON.

fourth hand, who was young, gazed at me all night with
a fixed and sleepy glare, as though on his guard lest I
should be seized with a refractory fit. At eight the close
atmosphere of the bakehouse was exchanged for the
fresh morning breeze by three out of the four hands,
who went to deliver the bread. The foreman remained
with the master to work at " small goods " until about
one, when he prepares the ferment for the next night's
baking. All concerned can get their operations over
about one or half-past one j so that, reckoning them to
begin at half-past twelve, and deducting two hours of
" sweat and tears " from one to three, when they can
sleep if they will, there are some eleven hours of active
labor. After the delivery of the bread is over, it should
be mentioned, each man has about half an hour's bake-
house work in the way of getting coals, cleaning biscuit
tins, brushing up, &c. When this is done, all, with the
exception of the foreman, who will have to look in and
make the sponge at eight p.m., are free until the com-
mencement of their most untimely work at midnight.

On Sunday, the work in this particular bakehouse is
comparatively nil. The ovens have to be started on
Sunday morning \ but this the master does himself, and
puts in the ferment, so that there is only the sponge to
be made in the evening — a brief hour's job, taken on
alternate Sundays by the foreman and the secondhand.
The " undersellers," my informant told me, made large
sums by Sunday bakings, often covering their rent by
them, so that their abandonment would be a serious
question ; but there was little in the way of Sabbath-
breaking in my typical bakehouse. As there were no
Sunday bakings, Saturday was a rather harder day than
others, there being a general scrub-up of the premises.

A NIGHT IN A BAKEHOUSE. p^

The work, my informant thought, could be condensed
by judicious co-operation, and the "four to four" rule
might be adopted in some establishments, but by no
means in all — as, for instance, where there was a
speciahty for rolls and fancy bread. It seems, as usual,
that the difficulties thicken, not about the necessaries,
but about the luxuries and kickshaws of life. The
master relieved my immediate fears by saying that he
scarcely imagined matters would come to a crisis.
There was this difference between the building and the
baking trades, that all the master bakers had been jour-
neymen themselves, and were thus able to sympathize
widi the men's difficulties. They were not, he seemed
to think, disposed to haggle over a few shillings ; but he
added, " This is not a question of labor against capital
only, but of labor against capital plus labor. I could,"
he said, "if my men left me on the 21st, make bread
enough myself to supply all my customers, only they
would have to fetch it for themselves."

Thus my worst fears were relieved. If it only came
to going out for my loaf, and even foregoing French
rolls, I could face that like a man ; so I paced the streets
gaily in the morning air and arrived home safely some
time after the milk, and about the same hour as those
rolls themselves whose hitherto unguessed history I had
so far fathomed by my brief experience in the bake-
house.

24 MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER VIII.

A LONDON SLAVE MARKET.

n^IIERE is a story called " Travellers' Wonders " in
-*- that volume which used to be the delight of our
childhood, when the rising generation was more easily
amused, and not quite so wide-awake as at present.
The point of the narrative is, that a facetious old gentle-
man named Captain Compass beguiles a group of juve-
niles— who mast have been singularly gullible even for
those early days — by describing in mysterious and alien-
sounding terms the commonest home objects, such as
coals, cheese, butter, and so on. It would almost seem
as though Hood must have been perpetrating a kindred
joke upon grown-up children when he wrote the lines —

It's O to be a slave

Along with the barbarous Turk,
Where woman has never a soul to save,

If this is Christian Work !

Was he aware that here, in the heart of Christian Lon-
don, without going farther east than Bethnal Green,
there had existed from time immemorial, as there exists
still, a genuine Slave Market ? Such there is, and ac-
tually so named ; less romantic, indeed, than that we
read of in " Don Juan," or used to see on the Adelphi
boards in the drama of the " Octoroon " — but still in-
teresting in its way to those who have a penchant for
that grotesque side of London life where the sublime
and the ridiculous sometimes blend so curiously.

A LONDON SLAVE MARKET. re

With only the vague address of Bethnal Green, and
the date of Tuesday morning, to guide me, I set out for
Worship Street PoHce Court, thinking it possible to
gain some further particulars from the police. I found
these functionaries civil, indeed, but disposed to observe
even more than official reticence about the Slave
Market. They told me the locality precisely enough,
but were even more vague as to the hour than my own
impressions. In fact, the sum of what I could gain
from them was, in slightly Hibernian language, that
there was nothing to see, and I could see it any time on
a Tuesday morning when I chose to go down White
Street, Bethnal Green. Leaving the Court and inquir-
ing my route to White Street, I found that it ran off to
the right some way down the Bethnal Green Road from
Shoreditch Station. Having turned out of the main
thoroughfare, you proceed down one of those character-
istic East End streets where every small householder
lives behind an elaborate bright green door with por-
tentous knocker, going on until an arch of the Great
Eastern Railway spans the road. Arriving at this point
any time between the hours of eight and half-past nine
on a Monday or Tuesday morning, you have no need to
be told that this is the East London Slave Market —
supposing you knew such a thing as a slave market was
to be seen in East London at all.

There was, indeed, nothing resembling Byron's graph-
ic description in " Don Juan." Our English slaves
were all apparently of one nation, and there were no
slave merchants. The hundred young ladies and gen-
tlemen, of all ages from seven to seventeen, were, as
they would have expressed it, " on their own hook."
Ranged under the dead brick wall of the railway arch,

56 MYSTIC LONDON.

there was a generally mouldy appearance about them.
Instead of a picturesque difference of color, there was
on every visage simply a greater or less degree of that
peculiar neutral tint, the unmistakable, unlovely hue of
London dirt. In this respect, too, they differed from
the fresh country lads and lasses one sees at a hiring in
the North. They were simply male and female City
Arabs, with that superabundant power of combining
business and pleasure which characterizes their race.
The young gentlemen, in the intervals of business — and
it seemed to be all intervals and no business — devoted
themselves to games at buttons. Each of the young ladies
— I am afraid to say how young — had her cavalier, and
applied herself to very pronounced flirtation. The lan-
guage of one and all certainly fulfilled the baptismal
promise of their sponsors, if the poor little waifs ever
had any — for it was " very vulgar tongue " indeed ; and
there was lots of it. The great sensation of the morn-
ing was a broken window in an unoffending tradesman's
shop — a far from unusual occurrence, as I learnt from
the sufferer. This led to a slave hunt on the part of
the single policeman who occasionally showed himself
to keep as quiet as might be the seething mass of hu-
manity ; and the young lady or gentleman who was
guilty of the damage was " off market " for the morn-
ing— while the suffering tradesman was assailed with a
volley of abuse, couched in strongest Saxon, for meekly
protesting against the demolition of his window-pane.

The scene was most characteristic — very unlike the
genteel West End Servants' Registry, where young
ladies and gentlemen's gentlemen saunter in to find
places with high wages and the work " put out." It
was on Tuesday morning, and a little late in the day,

A LONDON SLAVE MARKET. r;

that I timed my visit ; and I was informed that the
Market was somewhat flat. Certainly, one could not
apply to it the technicalities of the Stock Exchange, and
say that the little boys were " dull," or girls, big or little,
"inactive ;" but early on a Monday morning is, it ap-
pears, the time to see the Slave Market in full swing.
Strangely enough, so far as I could judge, it was all
slaves and no buyers — or, rather, hirers. I did not see
the symptom of a bargain being struck, though I was
informed that a good many small tradesmen do patron-
ize the Market, for shop-boys, nurse-girls, or household
drudges. I do not know whether my appearance was
particularly attractive ; but the number of offers I
received from domestics of all kinds would have suf-
ficed to stock half-a-dozen establishments. "Want a
boy, sir ? " " A girl for the childer, sir ? " said the
juveniles, while the offers of the adult ladies were more
emphatic and less quotable. All, of course, was mere
badinage, or, as they would have called it, " chaff," and
it was meant good-humoredly enough ; though, had I
been a legitimate hirer, I do not know that I should have
been tempted to add to my household from this
source. Indeed, there were some not exactly pleasant
reflections cast on the Slave Market by those whom I
c«^nsulted as to its merits. It was not unusual, I was
lold, for slaves who were hired on a Monday to turn up
again on Tuesday morning, either from incompatibility
of temper on the part of domestic and superior, or from
other causes unexplained. Tuesday morning is, in fact,
to a large extent, the mere residuum either of Monday's
unhired incapables, or of "returns." And yet as I
looked around, I saw — as where does not one see — ?
some young fair faces ; girls who might have played

^8 MYSTIC LONDON:

with one's little children all the better because they
were nearly children themselves j and boys of preter-
natural quickness, up to any job, and capable of being
useful — ay, and even ornamental— members of society,
if only that dreadful Bethnal Green twang could have
been eradicated. The abuse of the mother-tongue on the
part even of these children was simply frightful. If
this were so in their playful moods, what — one could
not help thinking — would it be if any dispute arose on
a contested point of domestic economy : as, for in-
stance, the too rapid disappearance of the cold mutton,
or sudden absence of master's boots ?

There was a garrulous cobbler whose stall bordered
on the Market, and his panacea for all the evils
the Slave Market brought witli it was the London
School Board. "Why don't the officers come down,
and collar some of them youngsters, sir ? " Why, in-
deed ? At present the Slave Market is undoubtedly a
nuisance ; but there is no reason why, under proper
police supervision, it should not become a local con-
venience. The ways of East London differ in all respects
from those of the West, and Servants' Registries would
not pay. Masters and Servants are alike too poor to ad-
vertise ; and there seems to be no reason why the Slave
Market, under a changed name, and with improved
regulations, may not as really supply a want as the
country " hirings " do. The Arab, at present, is not to
be trusted with too much liberty. Both male and fe-
male have odd Bedouin ways of their own, requiring
considerable and judicious manipulation to mould them
to the customs of civilized society. The respectable
residents, tired of the existing state of things, look not
unreasonably, as ratepayers, to the School Board to

TEA AND EXPERIENCE. ^o

thin down iJie children, and the police to keep the
adults in order. Under such conditions the Bethnal
Green Slave Market may yet become a useful institu-
tion.

CHAPTER IX.

TEA AND EXPERIENCE.

T WAS walking the other day in one of the pleasant
western suburbs, and rashly sought a short cut
back, when, as is generally the case, I found that the
longer w^ould have been much the nearer way home. Be-
fore I knew it, I was involved in the labyrinths of that re-
gion, sacred to washerwomen and kindred spirits,
known as Kensal New Town ; and my further progress
was barred by the intervention of the Paddingtcn Canal,
which is spanned at rare intervals in this locality by
pay-bridges, to the great discomfort of the often impe-
cunious natives. There was not even one of these at
hand, or my half-penny would have been paid under
protest ; so I had to wander like a lost sprite among
the net-work of semi-genteel streets that skirt that most
ungenteel thoroughfare, the Kensal New Town Road,
and forthwith I began to find the neighborhood papered
with placards, announcing a "Tea and Experience
Meeting" at a local hall, under the presidency of the
Free Church pastor, for the following Monday evening.
Bakers' shops bristled with the handbills, and they
studded the multitudinous pork butchers' windows in
juxtaposition with cruel-looking black puddings and

6o MYSTIC LONDON.

over-fat loin chops. I determined I would go, if not to
the tea, certainly to the " Experience," for I like novel
experiences of all kinds : and this would certainly be
new, whether edifying or not.

I got at length out of the labyrinth, and on the fol-
lowing Monday ventured once more within its mazes,
though not exactly at six o'clock, which was the hour
appointed for the preliminary experience of tea. I had
experienced that kind of thing once or twice before,
and never found myself in a position of such diffi-
culty as on those occasions. In the first place I do not
care about tea when it is good, but loathe it when
boiled in a washhouse copper, and poured out from a
large tin can, of M^iich it tastes unpleasantly. But
then again the quantity as well as the quality of the
viands to be consumed was literally too much for me.
I might have managed one cup of decidedly nasty tea,
or what passes muster for such, but not four or five,
which I found to be the minimum. I could stomach, or
secretly dispose of in my pockets, a single slice of lead-
en cake or oleaginous bread and butter; but I could
not do this with multitudinous slabs of either. I never
went to more than one tea-meeting where I felt at home,
and that was at the Soire'e Suisse, which takes place
annually in London, where pretty Helvetian damsels
brew the most fragrant coffee and hand round delicious
little cakes, arrayed as they are in their killing national
costume and chattering in a dozen different patois. I
had a notion that tea at Kensal New Town would be
very much less eligible, so I stopped away. Perhaps I
was prejudiced. The tea might have been very different
from what I expected. The experiences certainly were.

I got there about half-past seven, having allowed an

TEA AND EXPERIENCE, 6 1

interval of an hour and a half, which I thought would
be sufficient for the most inveterate tea-drinker, even
among the Kensal Town laundresses, should such hap-
pen to be present. I took the precaution, however, of
bespeaking a lad of fifteen to accompany me, in case
any of the fragments of the feast should yet have to be
disposed of, since I knew his powers to equal the os-
trich in stowing away eatables, especially in the lumpy
cake line. Arrived at the hall, however, I found no
symptoms of the tea save a steamy sort of smell and
the rattle of the retreating cups and saucers. Whether
'■'■ to my spirit's gain or loss," I had escaped the ban-
quet, and yet got in good time for the subsequent ex-
periences.

A motherly- looking woman stood at the door, and
gave me a cheery invitation to come in. She looked
rather askance at my boy, but finding him properly
convoyed by my sober self, she admitted him within
the portal. A good many young gentlemen of a similar
age were evidently excluded, and were regaling them-
selves with pagan sports outside. The hall was par-
tially filled with respectable-looking mechanics, their
wives and families, there being more wives than me-
chanics, and more families than either. Children
abounded, especially babies in every stage of infantile
development. Many were taking their maternal tea;
and the boys and girls were got up in the most festive
attire, the boys particularly shining with yellow soap.
Most of the mammas wore perky hats, and many had
follow-me-lads down the back, though all were exceed-
ingly well-dressed and well-behaved, though evidently
brimful of hilarity as well as cake and tea.

At the end of the hall was the inevitable platform,

62 MYSTIC LONDON.

with chairs and a large cushion spread over the front
rail for convenience of praying ; since the " experiences "
were to be interspersed with sacred song and prayer.
Two gentlemen — I use the term advisedly — mounted
the rostrum, one a long-bearded, middle-aged man, in a
frock coat, who was the pastor, and another, an aged
minister, superannuated, as I afterwards discovered,
and not altogether happy in his worldly lot. He was
very old, grey-haired, and feeble, with a worn suit of
clerical black, and a voluminous white tie. He sat
humbly, almost despondingly, by the side of his young-
er brother in the ministry, while the latter delivered a
merry little opening address, hoping all had made a
good tea; if not, there was still about half a can
left. Nobody wanted any more , so they had a hymn
from the " Sacred Songster," a copy of which volume I
purchased in the hall for twopence halfpenny. The
tune was a martial one, well sung by a choir of men and
women to the accompaniment of a harmonium, and
bravely borne part in, you may depend upon it, by the
whole assembly, I verily believe, except the babies, and
one or two of these put in a note sometimes. The
hymn was called, " Oh, we are Volunteers ! " and was
very Church-militant indeed, beginning thus : —

Oh, we are volunteers in the army of the Lord,
Forming into line at our Captain's word ;
We are under marching orders to take the battle-field,
And we'll ne'er give o'er the fight till the foe shall yield.

Then came the chorus, repeated after every verse :—

Come and join the army, the army of the Lord,
Jesus is our Captain, we will rally at His word:
Sharp will be the conflict with the powers of sin,
But with such a leader we are sure to win.

TEA AND EXPERIENCE. 63

The poor old minister offered up a short prayer. The
pastor read the ist Corinthians^ cliapter 13, and ex-
phiined briefly what charity meant there ; adding that
Liiis gathering was very Hke one of the Agapae of the
early Christians — a remark I had not expected to hear
in that assembly. Then there was another hymn,
" Beautiful Land of Rest," when it did one good to hear
the unction with which the second syllable of the refrain
was given : —

Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
Beautiful land of rest.

After this the " Experiences " commenced in real
earnest. Brothers and Sisters were exhorted to lay
aside shyness and mount the platform. Of course no
one would do so at first ; and the poor shaky old minis-
ter had to come to the rescue.

He told us, at rather too great length, the simple story
of his life — how he was a farmer's son, and had several
brothers "besides himself." He had to learn verses
of the Bible for his father, which used to go against
the grain, until at last, instead of being " a wicked
boy," he took up religion on his own account. He
began to be afraid that, if he died, he should go
to " a bad place," and therefore started saying his
prayers. His brother George used to push him
over when he was praying half-dressed in the bed-
room, or occasionally vary proceedings by stirring him
up with a sweeping brush. At last he found out a quiet
place under a haystack, and there retired to pray. The
old man drew a perfect picture of the first prayer thus
offered, and told us he could remember every little

64 MYSTIC LONDON.

detail of the spot, and the great oak tree spreading its
branches over it. " Here I am," he said, " a poor old
pilgrim on the bright side of seventy now, and yet I
can remember it all. I say the ' bright ' side, for I
know it is a bright home I am soon going to." Then
he told us how God took his wife from him and all his
worldly goods, and he was quite eloquent about the com-
fort his rehgion was to him now as he went to his little
lonely lodging. He drew next too truthful a picture of
the state of things he saw around him in Kensal New
Town — mothers with infants in their arms crowding the
tavern doors ; and finished up with a story, of which he
did not see the irrelevancy, about a fine lady going to
the " theatre " and saying how much she had enjoyed the
anticipation, then the play itself, and, lastly, the thought
of it afterwards. ■ She was overheard by a faithful pastor,
who told her she had omitted one detail. '^ No," she
said, " I have told you all." " You have told us how
you enjoyed the thoughts of the theatre, and the per-
formance, and the recollection of it afterwards ; but you
have not told us how you will enjoy the thoughts of it
on your death-bed." Of course the " fine lady" was
converted on the spot, as they always are in tracts ; and
the good old fellow brought his long-winded narrative
of experiences to an end by-and-bye, the pastor having
omitted to pull his coat-tails, as he promised to do
if any speaker exceeded the allotted time. " The
people were certainly very attentive to hear him," and
one man next my boy expressed his satisfaction by
letting off little groans, like minute guns, at frequent in-
tervals.

Then another hymn was sung, " The Beautiful Land
on High," which, by the way, is a favorite with the

TEA AND EXPERIENCE. 65

spiritualists at their " Face Seances^ I half expected
to see a ghostly-looking visage peep out of some corner
cupboard, as I had often done with my spiritual friends
— that being another experience which I cultivate with
considerable interest and curiosity. The hymn being
over, a black-bearded but soft-voiced man, in a velveteen
coat, got upon the platform, and told us how the chief
delight of his life was at one time making dogs fight.
When the animals were not sufficiently pugnacious of
themselves, his habit was to construct an apparatus,
consisting of a pin at the end of a stick, and so urge
them to the combat until it proved fatal to one of them.
It was, he said, dreadful work ; and now he consid-
ered it the direct machination of Satan. Another favor-
ite pursuit was interrupting the proceedings of open-air
missionaries. One day after he had done so, he went
home with a companion who had taken a tract from one
of the missionaries. He had a quarrel with his " missis."
"Not that missis sittin' there," he said, alluding to a
smart lady in front, " but my first missis." In order to
show his sulks against his missis, he took to reading the
tract, and it soon made him cry. Then he went to
chapel and heard a sermon on Lot's wife being turned
into a pillar of salt. He was a little exercised by this,
and saw the minister in the vestry, but soon fell back
into bad habits again, singing canaries for \os. 6d. a side.
As he was taking his bird out one Sunday morning, the
bottom of the cage came out, and the canary escaped.
This he looked upon as " God's work," since it caused
him to go to chapel that morning. His conversion soon
followed, and he applied to that circumstance, in a very
apposite manner, the Parable of the Prodigal, conclud-
ing with a stanza from the well-known hymn : —

S

66 MYSTIC LONDON. '

God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform.

Another moustached man followed. He was ex-
ceedingly well-dressed, though he told us he was only
a common laborer. He had long given up his " 'art "
to God, but to little purpose until he came to this chapel.
" But there," he said, " down in that corner under the
gas-lamp, I prayed for the first time. I prayed that
God would take away my stony 'art and give me a
'art of flesh, and renew a right sperrit within me."
From that time he led a new life. His fellow-workmen
began to sneer at the change, and said ironically they
should take to going to chapel too. " I wish to God
you would," was his reply. He described the personal in-
fluence of the pastor upon him, which strengthened the
good resolutions he had formed, and enabled him to
say, " I will not let Thee go."

I could not help thinking, as I listened to the simple,
earnest words of the speaker, that here was an element
the National Church is to apt to ignore. The Roman
Catholic Church would seize hold upon that man, and
put him in a working men's guild or confraternity. The
Free Church found him work to do, and gave him a
chief seat in the synagogue, and an opportunity of
airing his " experiences " on a platform. Surely better
either one or the other, than sotting his life at a public
house or turning tap-room orator. He ended by crying
shame upon himself for having put off the change until
so late in life, and added a wish that all the laboring
classes could see, as he had been brought to see, where
their chief interest a3 well as happiness lay.

A tall man from the choir followed, and was consider-
ably more self-possessed than the other two speakers.

TEA AND EXPERIENCE.

67

He told \ IS at the outset that he had been " a Chris-
tian " for fourteen years. It was generally laid down
as a rule, he said, that big men were good-tempered.
He was not a small man ; but until he gave his heart to
God he was never good-tempered. He had, for thirty
two years, been brought up in the Church of England
but had found no conversion there. He had no wish
to speak against the Church, but such was the case.
He wandered about a good deal in those years, from
Roman Catholic to Old Methodist chapels ; but the
latter settled him. He was attending a class meeting
in Kensal New Town one night, and suddenly a deter-
mination came over him that he would not sleep that
night until he had kneeled down and prayed with his
wife, though it would be the first time he had done so
for thirty-two years. When it came to bedtime his
courage failed him. He could not get into bed ; and
he did not like to tell his wife why. " That," he said,
" was the devil worritin' me," His wife said, " I know
w^iat's the matter with you. You want to pray. We
will see what we can do." His wife, he told us, was
" unconverted,'' but still she " throwed open the door "
on that occasion. He never knew happiness, he said,
until he came to Jesus ; and he added, " Oh, I do love
my Jesus," He often talked to his fellow-workmen
about the state of their souls, and they asked him how
it was he was so certain of being converted (a question,
I fancy, others than they would like to have solved),
and he answered them, " I feel it. I w^as uncomfort-
able before ; and now I am happy. I don't w^onder so
much at the old martyrs going boldly up to the stake,
because I feel I could do anything rather than give up
my Jesus."

68 ^^yS TIC L OND ON.

Hereupon the pastor, anticipating the departure of
some of the assembly — for the clock was pointing to ten
— announced a Temperance Meeting for the following
Monday, and also said he should like the congregation
to get up these meetings entirely on their own account,
without any " clerical " element at all, and to make
the Tea Meeting a " Free and Easy " in the best sense
of the word.

I went — shall I confess it ? — to the experience meet-
ing rather inclined to scoff, and I stopped, if not alto-
gether to pray, at least to think very seriously of the
value of the instrumentality thus brought to bear on such
intractable material as the Kensal New Town population.
The more cumbrous, even if more perfect or polished,
machinery of the Established Church has notoriously
failed for a long time to affect such raw material j and
if it is beginning to succeed, it is really by " taking a
leaf out of the book " of such pastors as the one whose
Tea-and-Experience Meeting I had attended. " Palmam
qui meruit fer at r

Stiggins element I must, in all justice, say there was
none. The pastor was a simple but a refined and
gentlemanly man ; so was the poor broken old min-
ister. There was no symptom of raving or rant ; no
vulgarity or bad taste. A gathering at a deanery or an
Episcopal palace could not have been more decorous,and
I doubt if the hymns could have been sung as heartily.
There was as little clerical starch as there was of the
opposite element. Rubbing off the angles of character
was one of the objects actually proposed by the pastor
as the result of these gatherings j and I really felt as
though a corner or two had gone out of my constitution.
If a man is disposed to be priggish, or a lady exclu-

SUNDAY LINNET-SINGING, 60

sive, in religious matters, I would recommend the one
or the other to avail themselves of the next opportunity
to attend a Tea-and-Experience Meeting at Kensal New
Town.

CHAPTER X.

SUNDAY LINNET-SINGING.

nPHERE is something very Arcadian and un-Cockney-
^ like in the idea of linnet-singing in Lock's Fields.
Imagination pictures so readily the green pastures and
the wild bird's song, and Corydon with his pipe and his
Phyllis, that it seems a pity to disabuse that exquisite
faculty of our nature so far as to suggest that the linnets
of which we speak are not wild, but tam.e and caged,
and the fields very much less rural than those of Lin-
coln's Inn. This was the announcement that drew me
to the New Kent Road on a recent Sunday morning to
hear what poor Cockney Keats called the " tender-
legged linnets : " " Bird-singing. — A match is made
between Thomas Walker (the Bermondsey Champion)
and William Hart (Champion of Walworth) to sing two
linnets, on Sunday, for 2/. a side ; birds to be on the
nail precisely at two o'clock ; the host to be referee.
\os. is now down j the remainder by nine this evening,
at the Jolly Butchers, Rodney Road, Lock's Fields.
Also a copper kettle will be sung for on the same day
by six pairs of linnets ; first pair up at half-past six
o'clock in the evening. Any person requiring the said
room for matches, &c., on making application to the
host, will immediately be answ^ered."

70

MYSTIC LONDON.

Rodney Road, be it known, is anything but a roman-
tic thoroughfare, leading out of the New Kent Road, a
little way from the Elephant and Castle ; and the cara-
vanserai bearing the title of the Jolly Butchers is an
unpretending beer-shop, with no outward and visible
signs of especial joviality. On entering I met mine
host, rubicund and jolly enough, who politely pioneered
me upstairs, when I reported myself as in quest of th^
linnets. The scene of contest I found to be a largis|
room, where some twenty or thirty most un-Arcadiaiv
looking gentlemen were already assembled, the only
adjunct at all symptomatic of that pastoral district being
their pipes, at which they were diligently puffing. The
whole of the tender-legged competitors, both for the
money and the copper kettle, were hanging in little
square green cages over the fireplace ; and the one idea
uppermost in my mind was how well the linnets must be
seasoned to tobacco smoke if they could sing at- all in
the atmosphere which those Corydons were so carefully
polluting. Corydon, besides his pipe, had adopted nuts
and beer to solace the tedium of the quarter of an hour
that yet intervened before the Bermondsey bird and its
Walworth antagonist were to be " on the nail ; " and
iDver and anon fresh Corydons kept dropping in, until
gome fifty or sixty had assembled. They were all of
one type. There was a " birdiness " discernible on the
outer man of each ; for birdiness, as well as horseyness,
writes its mark on the countenance and the attire. In
the latter department there was a proclivity to thick
pea-jackets and voluminoys white comforters round the
neck, thvough the day was springlike and the room
stuffy. The talk was loud but not boisterous, and
garnished with fewer elegant flowers of speech than one

SUNDA V LINNE l-SINGING. 7 1

would have expected. Five minutes before two the
non-competing birds were carefully muffled up in pocket-
handkerchiefs, and carried in their cages out of earshot,
lest their twitterings might inspire the competing min-
strels. Bermondsey and Walworth alone occupied the
nails. Scarcely any bets were made. They seemed an
impecunious assemblage, gathered for mere sport. One
gentleman did, indeed, offer to stake " that 'ere blowsy
bob," as though a shilling in his possession were a
rarity of which his friends must be certainly aware.
What was the occult meaning of the epithet "Blowsy"
I could not fathom, but there were no takers ; and,
after the windows had been opened for a few minutes
to clear the atmosphere, they were closed again ; the
door locked; the two markers took their place at a
table in front of the birds, with bits of chalk in their
hands ; mine host stood by as referee in case of dis-
putes j time was called ; and silence reigned supreme
for a quarter of an hour, broken only by the vocal per-
formances of the Bermondsey and Walworth champions
respectively. If a hapless human being did so far for-
get himself as to cough or tread incontinently upon a
nutshell, he was called to silence with curses not loud
but deep.

The Walworth bird opened the concert with a brilliant
solo by way of overture, which was duly reported by the
musical critic in the shape of a chalk line on the table.
The length of the effusion did not matter ; a long aria,
or a brilliant but spasmodic cadenza, each counted one,
and one only. The Bermondsey bird, heedless of the
issue at stake, devoted the precious moments to eating,
emitting nothing beyond a dyspeptic twitter which didn't
count ; and his proprietor stood by me evidently cha-

y2 MYSTIC LONDON,

grined, and perspiring profusely, either from anxiety or
superfluous attire. Nearly half the time had gone by
before Bermondsey put forth its powers. Meanwhile,
Walworth made the most of the opportunity, singing in
a manner of which I did not know linnets were capable.
There were notes and passages in the repertoire of
Walworth which were worthy of a canary. The bird no
doubt felt that the credit of home art was at stake, and
sang with a vigor calculated to throw foreign feathered
artistes into the shade. Bermondsey evidently sang best
after dinner, so he dined like an alderman ; yet dined,
alas ! not wisely, but too well, or rather too long. Then
he sang, first, a defiant roulade or so, as much as to
say, " Can you beat that, Walworth ? " pausing, with his
head wickedly on one side, for a reply. That reply was
not wanting, for Walworth was flushed with success ;
and one could not help regretting ignorance of bird-
language so as to gather exactly what the reply meant.
Then came a protracted duet between the two birds,
which was the piece de resistance of the whole perform-
ance. The silence became irksome. I could not help
congratulating myself on the fact that no Corydon had
brought his Phyllis ; for Phyllis, I am sure, would not
have been able to stand it. Phyllis, I feel certain,
would have giggled. We remained mute as mice,
solemn as judges. The ghost of a twitter was hailed
with mute signs of approval by the backers of each bird ;
but a glance at the expressive features of the host
warned the markers that nothing must be chalked down
that did not come up to his idea of singing. Had the
destinies of empires hung upon his nod he could scarcely
have looked more oracular. But Walworth could afford
to take matters easily now. For the last five minutes

^ UN DA Y LLWVE 7 -SI A 'GING. 7 ,

the Bermondsey bird did most of the music \ still it was
a hopeless case Success was not on the cards. By-
and-bye, time was again called. Babel recommenced,
and the result stood as follows :

Walworth 3 score 18

Bermondsey i score 10

It was an ignominious defeat truly; and, had one
been disposed to moralize, it had not been difficult to
draw a moral therefrom. It was not a case of " no
song, no supper ; " but of supper — or, rather, dinner —
and no song. Bermondsey had failed in the artistic
combat, not from lack of powers, as its brilliant part in
the duet and its subsequent soli proved, but simply from
a Sybaritic love for creature comforts. I ventured to
suggest it might have been expedient to remove the
seed, but was informed that, under those circumstances,
the creature — its proprietor called it an uglier name —
would not have sung at all. The remarkable part of
the business to me was that they did sing at the proper
time. They had not uttered anything beyond a twitter
until silence was called, and from that moment one or
the other was singing incessantly. I suppose it was the
silence. I have noticed not only caged birds, but chil-
dren— not to speak ungallantly of the fair sex — gener-
ally give tongue most freely when one is silent, and pre-
sumably wants to keep so.

The contest, however, was over, the stakes paid, and
Corydon sought his pastoral pipe again — not without
beer. It was a new experience, but not a very exciting
one — to me, at least. It evidently had its attractions
for the very large majority of attendants. In fact, Rod-
ney Road is generally a "birdy" neighborhood. Its

74

MYSTIC LONDON.

staple products, to judge by the shops, seemed birds
and beer. I was much pressed by mine host to stay
for the evening entertainment, when six birds were to
sing, and the attendance would be more numerous. As
some five hours intervened I expressed regret at my
inability to remain, reserving my opinion that five hours
in Lock's Fields might prove the reverse of attractive,
and Corydon in greater force might not have an agree-
able effect on that already stuffy chamber. So I took
myself off, wondering much, by the way, what strange
association of ideas could have led any imaginative man
to propose such an incongruous reward as a copper
kettle by way of premium for linnet-singing.

CHAPTER XI.

A woman's rights debate.

'T^HERE never was a time when, on all sorts of sub-
^ jects, from Mesmerism to Woman's Rights, the
ladies had so much to say for themselves. There is an
ancient heresy which tells us that, on most occasions,
ladies are prone to have the last word ; but certain it is
that they are making themselves heard now. On the
special subject of her so-called " Rights " the abstract
Woman was, I know, prodigiously emphatic — how em-
phatic, though, I was not quite aware, until having seen
from the top of a City-bound omnibus that a lady, whom
I will describe by the Aristophanic name of Praxagora,
would lecture at the Castle Street Co-operative Insti-

A WOMAN'S RIGHTS DEBATE.

75

tute. i went and co-operated so far as to form one of
that lady's audience. Her subject — the " PoUtical Sta-
tus of Women " — was evidently attractive, not only to
what we used in our innocence to call the weaker sex,
but also to those who are soon to have proved to them
the fallacy of calling themselves the stronger. A goodly
assemblage had gathered in the fine hall of the Co-
operators to join in demolishing that ancient myth as to
the superiority of the male sex. My first intention was to
have reported verbatim or nearly so the oration of Prax-
agora on the subject ; and if I changed my scheme it
was not because that lady did not deserve to be report-
ed. She said all that was to be said on the matter, and
said it exceedingly well, too ; but when the lecture,
which lasted fifty minutes, was over, I found it was to
be succeeded by a debate ; and I thought more might
be gained by chronicling the collision of opinion thence
ensuing than by simply quoting the words of any one
speaker, however eloquent or exhaustive.

I own with fear and trembling — for it is a delicate,
dangerous avowal — that, as a rule, I do not sympathize
with the ladies who declaim on the subject of Woman's
Rights. 1 do not mean to say I lack sympathy with
the subject — I should like everybody to have their
rights, and especially women — but they are sometimes
asserted in such a sledge-hammer fashion, and the ladies
who give them utterance are so prone to run large and be
shrill-voiced that their very ph3^sique proves their claim
either unnecessary or undesirable. I feel certain that
in whatever station of domestic life those ladies may be
placed, they would have their full rights, if not some-
thing more ; and as for Parliamentary rights, I tremble
for the unprotected males should such viragos ever com-

76

MYSTIC L ONDON.

pass the franchise ; or, worse still, realize the ambition
of the Ecclesiazusae of Aristophanes, and sit on the
benches of St. Stephen's clad in the nether garments
of the hirsute sex. There was nothing of that kind on
Tuesday night. In manner and appearance our pres-
ent Praxagora was thoroughly feminine, and, by her
very quietude of manner, impressed me with a con-
sciousness of power, and determination to use it. Her
voice was soft and silvery almost as that of Miss Faith-
full, herself ; and when, at the outset of her lecture, she
claimed indulgence on the score of never having spoken
in a public hall before, we had to press forward to the
front benches to catch the modulated tones, and men
who came clumping in with heavy boots in the course
of the lecture were severely hushed down by stern-
visaged females among the audience.

Disclaiming connexion with any society, Praxagora
still adopted the first personal plural in speaking of
the doctrines and intentions of the down-trodden fe-
males. " We " felt so and so ; " we " intended -to do
this or that ; and certainly her cause gained by the ele-
ment of mystery thus introduced, as well as by her own
undoubted power of dealing with the subject. "When
the " we " is seen to refer to the brazen-voiced ladies
aforesaid, and a few of the opposite sex who appear to
have changed natures with the gentle ones they cham-
pion, that plural pronoun is the reverse of imposing, but
the " we " of Praxagora introduced an element of awe,
if only on the onine ignotum p7'o magnifico principle.
In the most forcible way she went through the stock
objections against giving women the franchise, and
knocked them down one by one like so many ninepins.
That coveted boon of a vote she proved to be at the

A WOMAN'S RIGHTS DEBATE. yy

basis of all the regeneration of women. She claimed
that woman should have her share in making the laws
by which she was governed, and denied the popular as-
sertion that in so doing she would quit her proper
sphere. In fact, v/e all went with her up to a certain
point, and most of the audience beyond that point. For
myself I confess I felt disheartened when, having dealt
in the most consummate way with other aspects of the
subject, she came to the religious phase, and begging
the question that the Bible and religion discountenanced
woman's rights, commenced what sounded to me like a
furious attack on each.

Now I happen to know — what perhaps those who
look from another standpoint do not know — that this
aggressive attitude assumed so unnecessarily by the
advocates of woman's rights is calculated to keep back
the cause more than anything else ; and matter and
manner had been so much the reverse of hostile up to
the moment she plunged incontinently into the religious
question, that it quite took me by surprise. I have
known scores of people who, when they came under
vigorous protest to hear Miss Emily Faithfull on the
same fertile subject, went away converted because they
found no iconoclasm of this kind in her teaching. They
came to scoff and stopped, not indeed to pray, but to
listen very attentively to a theme which has so much to
be said in its favor that it is a pity to complicate its ad-
vocacy by the introduction of an extraneous and most
difficult question. So it was, however ; with pale ear-
nest face, and accents more incisive than before, Praxa-
gora said if Bible and religion stood in the way of
Woman's Rights, then Bible and religion must go. That
was the gist of her remarks. I need not follow her in

7 8 MYSTIC LONDON.

detail, because the supplementary matter sounded more
bitterly still ; and, had she not been reading from MS.
I should have thought the lecturer was carried away by
her subject ; but no, she was reading quite calmly what
were clearly enough her natural and deliberate opinions.
I said I was surprised at the line she took. Perhaps I
ought scarcely to have been so, for she was flanked on
one side by Mr. Bradlaugh, on the other by Mr. Hol-
yoake ! but I never remember being so struck with a
contrast as when at one moment Praxagora pictured
the beauty of a well-regulated home, and the tender
offices of woman towards the little children, and then
shot off at a tangent to fierce invectives against the
Bible and religion, which seemed so utterly uncalled
for that no adversary who wanted to damage the cause
could possibly have invented a more complete method
of doing so.

The lecture over, the chairman invited discussion,
and a fierce little working man immediately mounted
the platform, and took Praxagora to task for her injudi-
cious onslaught. But, as usual, this gentleman was
wildly irrelevant and carried away by his commendable
zeal. Over and over again he had to be recalled to
the question, until finally he set his whole audience
against him, and had to sit down abruptly in the mid-
dle of a sort of apotheosis of Moses — as far as I could
hear — for his zeal outran his eloquence as well as his
discretion, and rendered him barely audible. A second
speaker followed, and though cordially sympathizing
with the address, and tracing woman's incapacity to her
state of subjugation, regretted that such a disturbing
element as religion had been mixed up with a social
claim. He considered that such a subject must inevi-

A WOMAN'S RIGHTS DEBATE. 75

tably prove an apple of discord. For this he was at
once severely handled by Mr. Bradlaugh, who, consist-
ently enough, defended the line Praxagora adopted to-
wards the religious question, and justified the introduc-
tion of the subject from the charge of irrelevance. He
also deprecated the surprise which the last speaker had
expressed at the excellent address of Praxagora, by
pointing out that in America about one-third of the
press were females, a fact which he attributed to the
plan of Mixed Education. Then a new line was opened
up by a speaker — it was as impossible to catch their
names as to hear the stations announced by porters on
the Underground Railway. He predicted that if women
did get the franchise, Mr. Bradlaugh's " Temple " would
be shut up in six months, as well as those of Messrs.
Voysey and Conway and Dr. Perfitt. The ladies, he
said, were swayed by Conventionalism and Priestcraft,
and until you educated them, you could not safely give
them the franchise.

A youthful Good Templar mounted the rostrum, for
the purpose of patting Praxagora metaphorically on the
back, and also ventilating his own opinions on the
apathy of the working man in claiming his vote. Then
somebody got up and denied that the ladies were by
nature theological. Their virtues were superior to
those of men just as their voices were an octave high-
er. He was for having a Moral Department of the
State presided over by ladies. Only one lady spoke ;
a jaunty young woman in a sailor's hat, who said that in
religious persecutions men, not women, had been the
persecutors ; and then Praxagora rose to reply. She
first of all explained her position with regard to the
Bible, which she denied having unnecessarily attacked.

8o MYSTIC LONDON.

The Bible forbade a woman to speak ; and, that being
so, the Bible must stand on one side, for " we " were
going to speak. That the highest intellects had been
formed on Bible models she denied by instancing Shel-
ley. If she thought that this movement was going to
destroy the womanhood of her sex she would not move
a finger for its furtherance. She only thought it would
give a higher style of womanhood. As to women re-
quiring to be educated before they would know how to
use the franchise, she pointed triumphantly to the Gov-
ernment which men had placed in power. It was sig-
nificant, she said, that the first exercise of the working
men's franchise had been to place a Conservative Gov-
ernment in office.

I daresay I am wrong, but the impression left on my
mind by the discussion was that the liberty of thought
and action claimed was the liberty of thinking as " we "
think and doing what " 2^^^" want to have done — a
process which has been before now mistaken for absolute
freedom. Stripped of its aggressive adjuncts, Praxa-
gora's advocacy of her main subject would be telling in
the extreme from the fact of her blending such thorough
womanliness of person, character and sentiment with
such vigorous championship of a doctrine against which
I do not believe any prejudice exists. Drag in the
religious difficulty, however, and you immediately array
against it a host of prejudices, whether reasonable
ones or the reverse is not now the question. I am only
concerned with the unwisdom of having called them
into existence. I own I thought that Christianity had
been the means of raising woman from her state of
Oriental degradation to the position she occupies in
civilized countries. But I was only there to listen, not

AN OPEN-AIR TICHBORNE MEETING. 8 1

to speak ; and I confess I came away in a divided
frame of mind. I was pleased with the paper, but irri-
tated to think that a lady, holding such excellent cards,
should risk playing a losing game.

CHAPTER XII.

AN OPEN-AIR TICHBORNE MEETING.

\ 1 rHEN Sydney Smith, from the depth of his bar-
barian ignorance, sought to rise to the concep-
tion of a Puseyite, he said in substance much as fol-
lows : — " I know not what these silly people want, ex-
cept to revive every obsolete custom which the common
sense of mankind has allowed to go to sleep." Pusey-
ism is not to our present purpose ; but Tichborne-ism is
— for it has attained to the dignity of a veritable ism —
and we may define it much after the same method, as an
attempt, not; indeed, to revive the claims of, but to re-
store to society a person, who, after a trial of unex-
ampled length, was consigned by the verdict of a jury,
and the consequent sentence of the Lord Chief Justice,
to the possibly uncongenial retirement of Millbank
Penitentiary. With the rights or wrongs of such an
event I have simply nothing to do. I abandoned the
Tichborne trial at an early stage in a condition of utter
bewilderment ; and directly an old gentleman sought
to buttonhole me, and argue that he must be the man,
or he couldn't be the man, I made off, or changed the
conversation as rapidly as I could.
6

g2 MYSTIC LONDON.

But when the question had at length been resolved
by wiser heads than mine, and when, too, I felt I could
write calmly, with no fear of an action for contempt of
court before my eyes, I confess that a poster announcing
an open-air Tichborne meeting in Mr. Warren's cricket
field, Notting Hill, was too fascinating for me. I had
heard of such gatherings in provincial places and East
End halls ; but this invasion of the West was breaking
new ground. I would go ; in fine, I went. On the
evening of an exceptionally hot July day, I felt there
might be worse places than Mr. Warren's breezy cricket
ground alongside Notting Barn Farm j so six o'clock,
the hour when the chair was to be taken, found me at
the spot — first of the outer world — and forestalled
only by a solitary Tichbornite. How I knew that the
gentleman in question deserved that appellation I say
not ; but I felt instinctively that such was the case.
He had a shiny black frock-coat on, like a well-to-do
artizan out for a holiday, and a roll of paper protrud-
ing from his pocket I rightly inferred to be a Tichborne
petition for signature. As soon as we got on the
ground, and I was enjoying the sensation of the crisp,
well rolled turf beneath my feet, a man hove in sight
with a table, and this attracted a few observers. A
gentleman in a light coat, too, who was serenely gazing
over the hedge at the Kensington Park Cricket Club in
the next ground, was, they informed me, Mr. Guildford
Onslow. The presiding genius of the place, however,
was Mrs. Warren, who, arrayed in a gown of emerald
green — as though she were attending a Fenian meet-
ing— ^bustled about in a state of intense excitement un-
til the greengrocer's cart, which was to serve as a ros-
trum, had arrived. When this occurred, the table and

AN OPEN-AIR TICHBORNE MEETING. 83

half a dozen Windsor chairs were hoisted into it ; an-
other table was arranged below the van, with the Tich-
borne Petition outspread upon it ; and I fancied that
arrangements were complete.

Not so, however. The gentleman in the shiny coat
and emerald green Mrs. Warren between them tin-tack-
ed up a long scroll or " legend " along the rim of the
van, consisting of the text from Psalm xxxv. 11 : —
" False witnesses did rise up against me. They laid to
my charge things that I knew not." The association of
ideas was grotesque, I know, but really as Mrs. Warren
and the shiny artisan were nailing this strip to the green-
grocer's van, they put me very much in mind of a curate
and a lady friend " doing decorations " at Christmas or
Eastertide. Nor was this all. When the " strange de-
vice " was duly tin-tacked, some workmen brought four
long pieces of quartering, and a second strip of white
calico with letters stuck on it was nailed to these ; and
when the stalwart fellows hoisted it in air and tied the
two centre pieces of wood to the wheels of the green-
grocer's cart, I found that it consisted of the Ninth
Commandment. The self-sacrificing carpenters were
to hold — and did hold — the outside poles banner-wise
during the entire evening ; and, with one slight excep-
tion, this banner with the strange device. No. 2, formed
an appropriate, if not altogether ornamental background
for the greengrocer's van. Knots of people had gathered
during these proceedings ; and I was confused to find
that I was being generally pointed out as Mr, Onslow,
that gentleman having retired to the privacy of Mr.
Warren's neighboring abode. Later on I was taken for
a detective, because, in my innocence, I withdrew ever
and anon from the crowd, and, sitting on a verdurous

84

MYSTIC LONDON.

bank, jotted down a note in my pocketbook ; but, this
got me into such bad odor by-and-bye that I felt it
better to desist, and trust to memory. Some of the
smaller boys also averred that I was Sir Roger himself,
but their youthful opinions were too palpably erroneous
to carry weight.

In due course the van was occupied by Mr. Onslow,
the Rev. Mr. Buckingham (about whom I felt, of course,
very curious), my shining artizan, and a few others. A
thin-faced gentleman, whose name I could not catch,
was voted to the chair, and announced to us that he
should go on talking a while in order that Messrs. On-
slow and Buckingham might "refresh," as they had
each come from the country. This they did coram
publico in the cart, while the chairman kept us amused.
The wind, too, was blowing pretty freshly, and was
especially hard on the Ninth Commandment, which gave
considerable trouble to the holders of the props. It
was directly in the teeth of the speaker, too — an arrange-
ment which Mrs. Warren, in her zeal, had overlooked ;
and it was decided by common consent to " reverse the
meeting '* — that is, to turn the chairs of the speakers
round, so that the Ninth Commandment was nowhere,
and looked like an Egyptian hieroglyph, as the reversed
letters showed dimly through the calico. The chairman
eventually read to the meeting, which was now a toler.
ably full one, the form of petition which was to serve as
the single resolution of the evening. I was struck with
this gentleman's departure from conventional legal
phraseology on this occasion. Instead of naming the
cause celebre " The Queen versus Castro" (it being writ-
ten, as Sam Weller says, with a " wee") he termed it
'* The Queen via Castro ! " The petition was as fol-
lows : —

AN OPEN-AIR riCHBORNE MEETING. gq

" That in the trial at Bar in the Court of Queen's
Bench, on an indictment of the Queen v. Castro, ajias
Arthur Orton, alias Sir Roger Charles Doughty Tich-
borne, Bart., for perjury, the jury, on the 28th day of
February, 1874, brought in a verdict of guilty against
him, declaring him to be Arthur Orton, and he was sen-
tenced to fourteen years' penal servitude, which he is now
undergoing.

" That your petitioners have reason to know and be-
lieve and are satisfied, both from the evidence produced
at the trial and furnished since, and from their own
personal knowledge that he is not Arthur Orton.

" That though 280 witnesses were examined at the
said trial in his behalf, a very large number more, as
your petitioners have been informed and believe, were
also ready to be examined, but that funds were not
available for the purpose, the defendant having been
entirely dependent on the voluntary subscriptions of the
public for his defence.

" That your petitioners submit that such a large
number as 280 witnesses, most of whom gave positive
evidence that the defendant was not Arthur Orton, and
whose testimony in two instances only was questioned
in a court of law — as against about 200 witnesses for
the prosecution, whose evidence was chiefly of a nega-
tive character — was of itself enough to raise a doubt in
the defendant's favor, of which doubt he ought to have
had the benefit, in accordance both with the law and the
custom of the country.

" That, under the circumstances, your petitioners sub-
mit that he had not a fair trial, and they pray your
honorable House to take the matter into your serious
consideration, with a view to memorialize her Majesty
to grant a free pardon."

S6 MYSTIC LONDON.

The Rev. Mr. Buckingham, a cheery gentleman who
bore a remarkable resemblance to the celebrated Mr.
Pickwick, rose to move the resolution ; and I could not
not help noticing that, not content with the ordinary-
white tie of clerical life, he had '' continued the idea
downwards " in a white waistcoat, which rather altered
the state of things. He spoke well and forcibly I
should think for an hour, confining his remarks to the
subject of " Sir Roger " not being Arthur Orton. He
(Mr. Buckingham) belonged to some waterside mission
at Wapping, and had known Arthur Orton familiarly
from earliest boyhood. His two grievances were that
his negative evidence had not been taken, and that he
was now being continually waited on by " Jesuits," who
temptingly held out cheques for looo/. to him if he would
only make affidavit that the man in Millbank was Arthur
Orton.

Mr. Onslow, who seconded the resolution, however,
made the speech of the evening, and was so enthusias-
tically received that he had to recommence several times
after glowing perorations. The burden of Mr. Onslow's
prophecy was the unfairness of the trial ; and his
" bogies " were detectives, just as Mr. Buckingham's
were Jesuits. The Jean Luie affair was the most in-
fernal " plant " in the whole case ; and he read records
of conflicting evidence which really were enough to
make one pack up one's traps and resolve on instant
emigration. He was, however, certainly right on one
point. He said that such meetings were safety-valves
which prevented revolution. No doubt this was a safety-
valve. It amused the speakers, and Mrs. Warren and
the glazed artisan ; and it could do nobody any possible
harm. Whether it was likely to do the man of Mill-

AN OPEN-AIR TrCHDORNE MEETING. 87

bank any good was quite another matter, and one which,
of course, it was quite beside my purpose to discuss.
There was a deal of — to me — very interesting speaking ;
for I gained new light about the case, and stood until
my legs fairly ached listening to Messrs. Buckingham
and Onslow.

When the editor of the Tichborne Gazette claimed
an innings it was another matter ; and — perhaps with
lack of esprit de corps — I decamped. I only saw this
gentleman gesticulating as I left the field ; but the rate
at which he was getting up the steam promised a speech
that would last till nightfall.

As I went off the ground I was struck with the clever
way in which a London costermonger will turn anything
and everything to account. One of them was going
about with a truck of cherries, crying out, " Sir Roger
Tichborne cherries. Penny a lot ! "

There was no symptom of overt opposition, though
opponents were blandly invited to mount the wagon
and state their views ; but there was a good deal of
quiet chaff on the outskirts of the crowd, which is the
portion I always select on such occasions for my observa-
tion. On the whole, however, the assembly was pretty
unanimous ; and though it never assumed the dimensions
of a " monster meeting," the fact that even so many
people could be got together for such a purpose seemed
to me sufficiently a sign of the times to deserve annota-
tion in passing.

88 MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER XIII.

SUNDAY IN A PEOPLE'S GARDEN.

T HAVE often thought that an interesting series of
articles might be written on the subject of " London
out of Church," dealing with the manners and customs
of those people who patronize no sort of religious
establishment on the Sunday. I have seen pretty well
all the typical phases of religious London and London
irreligious ; but these would rather be characterized as
non-religious than as irreligious folks. They do not
belong to any of the varied forms of faith ; in fact,
faith is from their life a thing apart. It is in this
negative way that they are interesting. Sunday is
with them only a regularly recurring Bank Holiday.
It would be interesting to know what they do with it.
A special difficulty, however, exists for me in any such
inquiry, resulting from the fact that, in my capacity
of clerical casual, I am pretty generally engaged on the
Sunday ; and, when I am not, my Day of Rest is
too valuable to be devoted to any of the manifold
forms of metropolitan Sabbath-breaking. I have a
great idea that parsons ought to be frequently preached
at ; and so I generally go to some church or chapel
when out of harness myself ; and if " hearing sermons "
constitute the proper carrying out of the things promised
and vowed on my behalf at baptism I must have under-
gone as complete a course of Christian discipline as any
man in Christendom, for I have been preached at by

SUNDA V IN A PEOPLE'S GARDEN. 89

everybody from Roman Catholics down to Walworth
Jumpers and Plumstead Peculiars !

But, impressed with anxiety to know about the
doings of the non-church-goers^ I have for a long
time cast sheep's eyes at the Sunday League, and
more than once definitely promised to join one of their
Sunday outings ; but I am strongly of Tom Hood's
opinion that —

The man who's fond precociously of stirring
Must be a spoon.

The Sunday League commence their excursions at
untimely hours ; and it is a cardinal point in my creed
that Sunday ought to be a Day of Rest, at all events
in the matter of breakfast in bed. I missed the excur-
sion to Shakespeare's House in this way, and the paper
on the Bard of Avon, full of the genius loci, must have
been as edifying as a serm.on. So, too, on a recent
Sunday, when the Sunday League on their way to
Southend got mixed up with the Volunteer Artillery
going to Shoebury, I was again found wanting. But
still the old penchant remained, and Sunday was my
last free one for a long time. How could I utilize it ?
I had it ; I would go to the People's Garden at Willes-
den. I had heard that certain very mild forms of
Sabbath breaking prevailed there. I would go and see
for myself.

I had been at the People's Garden twice before ;
once on the occasion of a spiritualistic picnic, and once,
more recently, at a workmen's flower show ; and felt
considerable interest in the place, especially as the
People had been polite enough to send me a season
ticket, so that I was one of the People myself.

go MYSTIC LONDON.

This People's Garden was not exactly a Paradise yet,
though it is in a fair way of becoming one. It is a spot
of some fifty acres reclaimed from the scrubbiest part
of Wormwood Scrubbs, and made the focus of a club of
working men, of whom I am very proud indeed to be
one. Indeed, I do not see why throughout the re-
mainder of this article I should not use the first person
plural. I will. Well, then, we secured this spot, and
we have got, in the first place, one of the finest — I
believe the finest — dancing platform in England, for
we, as a community, are Terpsichorean, though I, as an
individual, am not. I felt it necessary to give up danc-
ing when my weight turned the balance at fourteen stone
odd. Then we can give our friends refreshments from
a bottle of champagne down to tea and cresses. We
have all sorts of clubs, dramatic and otherwise, and
rather plume ourselves on having put up our proscenium
ourselves — that is, with our own hands and hammers
and nails. There is the great advantage of being a
Working Man or one of the People. If you had been
with me that Sunday you would have seen a glow of
conscious pride suffusing my countenance as I read the
bills of our last amateur performance, consisting of the
" Waterman " and " Ici on parle Frangais," played on
the boards which I, in my corporate capacity, had
planed, and sawn, and nailed. My route last Sunday
lay across the crisp sward of the Scrubbs, and it was
quite a pleasure to be able to walk there without danger
of falling pierced by the bullet of some erratic volun-
teer j for there are three butts on Wormwood Scrubbs,
which I examined with minuteness on Sunday, and was
exercised to see by marks on the brickwork how very
wide of the target a volunteer's shot can go. I wonder

SUNDA Y IN A PEOPLE'S GARDEN. 91

there is not a wholesale slaughter of cattle in the neigh-
boring fields. The garden lies on the other side of the
Great Western Railway, across which I had to trespass
in order to get to it. But the man in charge regarded
me with indulgence, for was I not a working man and a
" mate ? " The portion of the garden abutting on the
rail is still unreclaimed prairie. The working men
have begun at the top of the hill, and are working
downwards.

There is a good-sized refreshment-room at the en-
trance, with all the paraphernalia of secretary's office,
&c. j and this large room, which is exceedingly useful
in wet weather, opens right on to the dancing platform,
in the centre of which is a pretty kiosk for the band.
We have no gas ; but tasty paraffin lamps at frequent in-
tervals give sufficient light, and, at all events, do not
smell worse than modern metropolitan gas. There is a
large tent standing en permanence ^Mxmg\h^ summer for
flower shows, and terrace after terrace of croquet lawns,
all of which, it will, I fear, shock some Sabbatarian per-
sons to learn, were occupied on that Sunday afternoon,
and the balls kept clicking like the week-day shots of
the erratic riflemen on the Scrubbs. I had a young
lady with me who was considerably severe on the way in
which we workmen, male and female, handled our mal-
lets. There was, I confess, something to be desired in
the way of position ; and one group of German artisans
in the corner lawn made more noise than was necessary,
howling and uttering all sorts of guttural interjections,
as though they were playing polo at least, or taking part
in a bull-fight, instead of in croquet — beloved of curates.

And then the flowers. We are making the desert
blossom like the rose. It is really marvellous to see

g2 MYSTIC LONDON.

what has been done in so short a time. We might have
been a society of market gardeners. We don't get so
many flowers along the walk of life, we working men ;
so that we want to see a bit of green sward and a flower
or two on Sundays. There is a capital gymnasium, and
our observation of the young men who disport them-
selves there would lead an uninitiated observer to form
the opinion that the normal condition of humanity was
upside down. The way one youthful workman hung by
his legs on the trapeze was positively Darwinian to be-
hold. Swings attracted the attention of the ladies ; and
I regret to say that the particular young lady I escorted
— who was of the mature age of twelve — passed most
of the afternoon in a state of oscillation, and was con-
tinually adjuring me to push her.

An interesting addition to the gardens — our gardens
— since I was last there, consisted of a cage of medita-
tive monkeys, four in number, who were stationed so
near the gymnasium as inevitably to suggest the Dar-
winian parallel. They had their gymnasium too, and
swung gaily on their tree-trunks at such times as they
were not engaged in eating or entomological researches.
I could not help thinking what a deprivation it was to
the gymnasts that, in course of evolution, we have lost
our tails. They would have been so convenient on the
horizontal bar, where that persevering young workman
was still engaged in the pursuit of apoplexy by hanging
head downwards. Soon after we got there an excellent
band commenced playing, not in the kiosk, lest we
should be beguiled into dancing. The first piece was
a slow movement, which could scarcely have been ob-
jected to by any Sabbatarian unless he was so uncom-
promising as to think all trumpets wrong. The second

SUNDA V IN- A PEOPLE'S GARDEN: 93

was the glorious march from " Athalie ; " and then — my
blood runs cold as I write it — a sort of potj^ourri, in the
midst of which came the " Dutchman's Little Wee Dog,"
considerably disguised in the way of accompaniment
and variation, I own, but the " Little Wee Dog '* beyond
a doubt. Then I understood why the band was not in
the kiosk ; for, fourteen stone tliough I be, I felt all my
toes twiddling inside my boots at that time as wickedly
as though it had been Monday morning. There were
fourteen or fifteen loud brass instruments, with a side
and bass drum and cymbals. All these were playing
the " Little Wee Dog " to their brazen hearts' content,
and only one gentleman on a feeble piccolo-fiute trying
to choke their in^^piety by tootling out a variation, just
as the stringed instruments in the glorious " Reforma-
tion Symphony " of Mendelssohn try in vain to drown
with their sensuous Roman airs the massive chords of
the old Lutheran chorale — '' Ein feste Burg ist unser
Gotty I really could not bear it any longer, and was
rising to go when they stopped ; and as the gentleman
who played the circular bass got outside his portentous
instrument, I found he had a little v/ee dog of his own
who retired into the bell of the big trumpet when his
master laid it on the grass. Perhaps it was in honor of
this minute animal the air was selected. However, I
could not lend myself to such proceedings ; so I bribed
my youthful charge with a twopenny bottle of frothless
ginger beer to come out of her swing and return to the
regions of orthodoxy. The Teutonic gentlemen were
still hooting and yelling as we crossed the corner of
their croquet lawn, until I expected to see them attack
one another with the mallets and use the balls for mis-
sile warfare ; but it was only their peculiar way of en-
joying themselves.

54 MYSTIC LONDON.

My little friend described the action of our working-
men in the croquet lawn as " spooning," and also drew
my attention to the fact that two lovers were doing the
same on a seat, in the approved fashion prevalent
among us workmen, with the manly arm around the
taper waist coram publico. This arrangement is quite
a necessity v/ith us. We should often like to forego it,
especially when little boys make rude remarks about us
in the street ; but it is expected of us, and we submit.

The sun was beginning to sink grandly over that mag-
nificent panorama of country visible from Old Oak Com-
mon as we passed down the hill and again violated the
bye-laws of the Great Western Railway Company. The
spires of the West End churches were bathed in the soft
glow of departing day; and in the distance the Crystal
Palace glittered like a fairy bower. We got back after
making a little Mtoiir on account of some gentlemen
who were bathing in a very Paradisiacal way indeed—
we actually got back in time to go to church like good
Christians ; and I do not think either of us felt much
the worse for the hours we had spent in the People's
Garden — save and except the wicked Little Wee Dog 1

CHAPTER XIV.

UTILIZING THE YOUNG LADIES.

'T^IME was when it was accepted as an axiom that
young ladies had no object in life but to be orna-
mental— no mission but matrimony. The " accomplish-
ments " were the sum total of a genteel education.

UTILIZING THE YOUNG LADIES.

95

though charged as " extras " on the half-yearly accounts ;
and all the finished creature had to do, after once
"coming out," was to sit down and lang-uidly wait for an
eligible suitor.

Times changed. And, in England, when we make
a change, we always rush violently into an opposite ex-
treme. Woman had a mission, and no mistake. Now
it was the franchise and Bloomer costume, just as afore-
time it was the pianoforte and general fascination.
Blue spectacles rose in the market. We had lady doc-
tors and female lawyers. The only marvel is that there
was no agitation for feminine curates.

Then came reaction again. It was discovered that
woman could be educated without becoming a blue-
stocking, and practical without wearing bloomers or
going in for the suffrage. Still holding to the whole
some principle that " w^oman is not undeveloped man ,
but diverse," the real friends of the gentler sex discov-
ered a hundred and one ways in which it could employ
itself usefully and remuneratively. It was no longer
feared lest, as Sydney Smith puts it, if a woman learnt
algebra she would " desert her infant for a quadratic
equation ; " and the University of Cambridge soon fell
in with the scheme for the Higher Education of Women ;
while Miss Faithfull, and several others, organized
methods for employing practically the talents which
education could only develope in a general way. It
was to one of these methods — not Miss Faithfull's —
my attention was drawn a short time since by a letter
in the daily papers. The Victoria Press and Interna-
tional Bureau are faits acco7nplis^ and it is well that ef-
forts should be made for utilizing in other ways that
interesting surplus in our female population. Mrs. Fer-

^6 MYSTIC LONDON.

nando, of Warwick Gardens, Kensington, has set herself
to the solution of the problem^ and the shape her
method takes is a Technical Industrial Scliool for Wo-
men.

The object and aim of the institution is to examine,
plan, and organize such branches of industrial avocation
as are applicable to females, and open up new avoca-
tions of useful industry compatible with the intellectual
and mechanical capabilities of the sex, not forgetting
their delicacy, and the untutored position of females
for practical application in all industrial labor ; to give
the same facilities to females as are enjoyed by males,
in collective classes for special training or special prepa-
ration for passing examinations open to women, thereby
to enable them to eani their livelihood with better suc-
cess than is attainable by mere school education only ;
to give special training to females to qualify them to
enter special industrial avocations with such compe-
tency as will enable them to be successful in obtaining
employment : to apprentice females, or to employ them
directly into trades where such employers will receive
them beyond the limits of the industrial school, and
where females can be constantly employed, such as in
composing, embossing, illuminating, black-bordering,
ticket-writing, circular-addressing, flower-making, flower-
cultivating, etc.

Being a determined skeptic in the matter of prospect-
uses, I determined to go and see for myself the working
of this scheme, which looked so well on paper. The
institution occupies a large house directly opposite Di,
Punshon's chapel : and there is no chance of one's
missing it, for it is placarded with announcements like
a hoarding at election time. I found Mrs. Fernando

UTILIZING THE YOUNG LADIES, 97

an exceedingly practical lady, doing all the work of the
institution herself, with the exception of a few special
subjects, such as botany, &c., which are conducted by
her husband. There are no " assistants," therefore, or
deputed interests, the bane of so many high-priced
schools.

These classes are held in the evening from seven to
nine o'clock, and are intended for ladies above the age
of fifteen years, who may be engaged through the day
in various occupations, and for such as suffer from
neglected education, and who wish conveniently and
economically to improve themselves without being ne-
cessitated to mix with their juniors in day-schools.
These classes prepare ladies to meet the qualifications
necessary to enter clerkships and other official depart-
ments ; to bring them also to a standard to meet the
qualifications for post-ofhces and telegraph departments;
and also to pass certain examinations open to them.
The charge is only 2s. per week — Si", per month — £^A^'
per quarter. The first course embraces spelling, read-
ing, writing, arithmetic, history, geography, and gram-
mar. The second course consists of advanced arith-
metic, book-keeping, a.nd commercial instruction, so as
to qualify women to take posts of responsibility with
marked success. The third course consists of French,
for practical usefulness. The fourth course embraces
simple or technical training, in such departments as are
available within the limits of the class-room, to qualify
women to enter industrial avocations with competency,
and to make them successful in obtaining employment.
This department will be extended to greater usefulness
as conveniences arise, by apprenticing the girls or em-

98 MYSTIC LONDON.

ploying them directly in trades beyond the limits of the
class-room, where employers will receive them, or where
women could be consistently engaged — as, for instance,
in the work of compositors, ticket-writers, embossers,
etc., etc.

The two classes with which I was brought into contact
were the book-keeping and embossing. In the former,
more than a dozen young ladies were being initiated in
the mysteries of single and double entry, and they
posted up their books in a way that made me feel very
much ashamed of myself, when I thought how incapable
I should be of doing anything half so useful. Many
girls go from this department to be book-keepers at
large hotels, places of business, &c.

I then went to the embossing room, where six presses
were being worked by as many young ladies, one in an
adjoining room being reserved for Mrs. Fernando, who
not only tells her pupils what to do, but shows them how
to do it. The gilding and coloring of the stamps was
most elaborate ; two monograms, of the Queen's name
and that of the Empress Eugenie, being perfect mar-
vels of artistic and intricate workmanship. Every pro-
cess, from mixing the colors up to burnishing the gold,
was gone through in detail by this practical lady and
her intelligent pupils for my special edification, and I
passed out a much wiser, and certainly not a sadder
man, than I entered this veritable hive of human
bees.

No expense was spared in the education of these
girls, low as are the terms they pay. I saw quite a ruinous
heap of spoilt envelopes and fashionable sheets of thick
cream-laid \ for they have to make their experiments on
the best material, and the slightest alteration in the

FAIR LOP FRIDA Y.

99

position of a pin, where the stamping process has to be
several times repeated, spoils the whole result. Mrs.
Fernando has also introduced envelope and circular-
addressing b}^ women, as a department of female indus-
trial work in the Technical Industrial School for
Women, where a number of females are employed be-
tween the hours of ten and four o'clock, receiving satis-
factory remuneration. She provides the females em-
ployed in this department evening classes free of
charge, to improve themselves in general education.

I am an intense admirer of the female sex in general,
and young ladies in particular ; but really when I came
away, leaving my pretty book-keepers and embossers to
resume their normal work, and saw the numbers of
young ladies sitting listlessly over misnamed ''work"
at the window, or walking languidly nowhither in the
streets, I thought that, without losing any of their
attractions — nay, adding a new claim to the many ex-
isting ones on our regard — they might with great ad-
vantage take a turn at Mrs. Fernando's sixpenny lessons
in technical education.

CHAPTER XV.

FAIRLOP FRIDAY.

A MONGST those customs " more honored in the
■^■^ breach than the observance" which are rapidly
being stamped out by the advancing steps of civilization,
are the institutions which we can yet remember as so
popular in the days of our childhood, called pleasure

xoo MYSTIC LONDON.

fairs. Like that social dodo in a higher section of
society, the " three-bottle man," with the stupid Bacchan-
alian usages of which he was the embodiment, these
fairs are slowly but surely disappearing as education
spreads among the masses of the people. In the country
a fair is a simple and a necessary thing enough. At
certain seasons of the year, according to the staple
commodities for the sale of which the assemblage was
originally instituted, our bucolic friends gather at early
morning with the products of their farms \ a good deal
of noisy buying, selling, and barter takes place. Later
in the day the ladies invest their profits in a little mild
finery, or in simple pleasures ; and. later still, when the
public houses have done their work, comes a greater or
lesser amount of riot, rude debauchery, and vice ; and
then, voila tout — the fair is over for a year. One can
easily imagine the result of the transition when, from
the quiet country, the fair removes to the city or suburb.
In such places even utilitarian element is wanting, and
the gilt ginger-bread and gewgaws are only a speciously
innocent attraction towards the drinking and dancing
booth where the mischief is done. Well-wishers to
society are unromantic enough not to regret the decid-
edly waning glories of these gatherings, from the great
Bartholomew Fair itself down to that which, on the
Friday of which I write, converted many miles of thor-
oughfare at the East End of London, as well as one of
the prettiest forest scenes still surrounding the metrop-
olis, into a Mdi^lal fresco tavern, where the "worship of
Bacchus" was as freely indulged as in any heathen
temple of ancient times.

Fairlop Fair — which has not yet died out, though be-
ginning to show satisfactory signs of decay — commenced

FAIRL OP FRIDA Y. I o i

its existence, innocently enough, about a century ago.
At tliat time Mr. Day, a shipbuilder, wishing to have a
day's outing in the forest with his friends and employes,
fitted up a vessel on wheels, fully rigged, in which he
conveyed his picnic party to Hainault Forest, on the
outskirts of which, some distance from Ilford, stood the
famous Fairlop Oak. The holiday became an annual
custom, and gradually changed its character from the
simple gathering of a master and his men into regular
saturnalia \ during which, each year, from the first Fri-
day in July, over the ensuing Saturday and Sunday, riot
and debauchery reigned supreme in the glades of the
forest and the eastern districts of London. The ex-
ample set by Mr. Day was followed by other ship, boat,
and barge builders, but of late years, more particularly
by the mast and block makers, riggers, shipwrights, and
shipyard laborers ; and more recently still by the
licensed victuallers. Finding the custom good for
trade, the publicans formed a society for building or
hiring these boats on wheels, which, covered with flags,
and provided each with a band of music and filled with
revellers, annually make their progress into Hainault
Forest. They go no longer, alas ! to Fairlop Oak — for
that is numbered with the things of the past — but now
to Barking side, where, at the Maypole Inn, the festiv-
ities of Fairlop Fair are still kept up.

These ship and boat cars attract immense multitudes
along the Mile End, Bow, and Whitechapel Roads,
down as far as Aldgate ; the crowd assembled in the
morning to see the holiday people start on their expedi-
tion. The most remarkable sight, however, is at night
when the " boats '' return lighted with colored lanterns,
red and green fires, &c. ; and at every public-house

102 MYSTIC LONDON.

along the road similar fires are burnt, and brass bands
stationed to strike up as the cars pass, and stop at cer-
tain favored establishments "for the good of the house."
Anxious to witness the fading glories of Fairlop Friday
myself, before the advancing tide of civilization shall
have done their inevitable work upon them, I sallied
forth to tlie East End, and walking along one of the
finest approaches to London, from Aldgate, by White-
chn.pel, to Bow and Stratford Churches, succeeded in
realizing more completely than ever before two facts:
first, how gigantic is the population of the East End of
London ; and secondly, how little is required to amuse
and attract it. There were only two of the " boats "
sent to the Forest that year. Their return could gratify
the sight of those people but for a single instant ; yet
there, from early dusk almost to succeeding daylight,
those working men, literally " in their thousands " — and
not in the Trafalgar Square diminutive of that expres-
sion— gathered to gratify themselves with the sight of
the pageant. In comparison, "the ^'- Boeuf Gras^'' yN\\\Qh
annually sends the gamins of Paris insane, is really a
tasteful and refined exhibition. Yet there they were,
women, men, and children — infants in arms, too, to a
notable extent — swarming along that vast thoroughfare,
boozing outside the public-houses, investing their pence
in " scratch-backs " and paper noses, feathers and deco-
rations, as do their betters on the course at Epsom,
under the feeble excuse of "waiting for the boats."
The first arrival en route at Stratford Church about ten
o'clock ; and certainly the appearance of the lumbering
affair as it moved along, with its rigging brought out by
means of colored fires, lanterns, and lamps, was odd
enough. As soon as it passed me at Stratford, I jumped

FAIR LOP FRIDA V. 1-03

outside one of the Bow and Stratford omnibuses, and so
had an opportunity of following, or rather joining in,
the procession as far as Whitechapel, where the " boat "
turned off into Commercial Road. For the whole of
that space the footway was filled with one seething mass
of humanity, and the publicans were driving a rattling
trade outside and inside their establishments. As the
glare of the colored fires lighted up the pale faces of
the crowd with a ghastly hue, and I heard the silly and
too often obscene remarks bandied between the by-
standers and the returning revellers, I could not help
agitating the question, whether it would not be possible
to devise some innocent recreation, with a certain
amount of refinement in it, to take the place of these —
to say the best — foolish revelries. In point of fact, they
are worse than foolish. Not only was it evident that
the whole affair from beginning to end, as far as adults
were concerned, was an apotheosis of drink ; but
amongst another section of the populace, the boys and
girls, or what used to be boys and girls — for, as the
Parisians say, " // n'y a plus de garfons " — one must
have been blind indeed not to see the mischief that was
being done on those East End pavements ; done more
thoroughly perhaps, certainly on a vastly larger scale,
than in the purlieus of the forest. It is an uninviting
subject to dwell upon ; but one could understand all
about baby farms, and Lock Hospitals, and Contagious
Diseases Acts, out there that July night, in the crowded
streets of East London.

It would be unfair to dilate upon these evils, and not
to mention an organization which, for the last ten years,
has been seeking to remedy the mischief. Some hun-
dreds of working men of a more serious stamp, aided by

I04 MYSTIC LONDON,

a few gentlemen and ministers of various denomina-
tions, form themselves into small bands of street preach-
ers, and sallying forth in a body, hold services and
preach sermons at the most populous points of the Fair-
lop route. Being curious to see the effect of their bold
labors — for it requires immense "pluck" to face a
Whitechapel mob — I joined one of these detachments,
where the Rev. Newman Hall was the preacher. Before
starting, this gentleman gave it as the result of his long
experience with the British workman that there is no
use in waiting for him to come to church. If the church
is to do anything with him, it must go out and meet him
in the streets and fields, as it originally did. Mr. Hall
gave some amusing illustrations of his experience at
Hastings, where, for several weeks, he had been preach-
ing on the beach to large congregations. He was idling
there, he said, for health's sake, and one evening, seeing
a number of men loafing about, he proposed to one of
them that he should give them an address. This gentle-
man declined the address, but added, characteristically
enough, " If ye'U gie me some beer I'll drink it." Two
others, being asked if they would listen, " didn't know
as they would." Under these unpromising auspices,
Mr. Hall began, and, attracting a crowd, was " moved
on " by a policeman. A gentleman who recognized him
proposed an adjournment to the beach, and there a ser-
mon was preached, and has been repeated by Mr. Hall
on several occasions, with a congregation of thousands.
He has a peculiar knack of speaking in a tongue " under-
standed of the people," and his address to the Fairlop
crowd on that Friday night " told " considerably. At
its conclusion he quietly put on his hat, dropped into
the crowd, and went his way ; but the tone of criticism

A CHRISTMAS DIP.

^05

amongst his hearers was very favorable, and I quite
agree with the critics that it's a pity we haven't " more
parsons like that." It is not, however, simply by relig-
ious zeal such a want as that to which I allude is to be
supplied, but by the substitution of some sensible recrea-
tion for the low attractions of the beershop and gin-
palace. It is a problem worthy of our deepest think-
ers : "What shall we offer our huge populations in
exchange for the silly pageant even now being enacted
in the outskirts of the metropolis — which may well be
taken to embody the pastime of the lower orders — Fair-
lop Fair ? "

CHAPTER XVI.

A CHRISTMAS DIP.

'T^ HERE are few more exhilarating things, on a breezy
spring morning, than a spurt across that wonderful
rus in iirbe — Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park — for
a prospective dip in the Serpentine, where, at specified
hours every morning and evening, water-loving London
is privileged to disport itself in its congenial element.
So congenial is it, in fact, that some enthusiastic indi-
viduals do not limit themselves to warm summer morn-
ings, or the cooler ones of springtide and autumn, but
bathe all the year round — even, it is said, when a way
for their manoeuvres has to be cut through the ice.
Skirting the north bank of the Serpentine at morning or
evening in the summer, the opposite shore appears abso-
lutel}- -pink with" nude humanity, the younger portion

I05 MYSTIC LONDON.

dancing and gambolling very much after the manner ol
Robinson Crusoe's cannibals. The bathers occasionally
look a great deal better out of their integuments than
in them. Not from this class, however, do your all-the-
y ear-round bathers come. The Arab is an exotic — a
child of the Sun, loving not to disport himself in water
the temperature of which shocks his tentative knuckles,
as he dips them in the unaccustomed element. His
wardrobe, again, is too much after the fashion of that
pertaining to Canning's needy knife-grinder to make an
al fresco toilette other than embarrassing. From the
all-the-year-round bathers, as a nucleus, there has grown
up, within the last few years, the Serpentine Swimming
Club ; and on Christmas-day in the morning they have
an annual match open to all comers— though, it need
scarcely be said, patronized only by those whom, for
brevity's sake, we may term all-rounders.

Now, I had often heard of this Christmas-day match,
and as often, on Christmas-eve, made up my mind to
go \ but the evening's resolution faded away, as such
resolutions have only too often been known to do, before
the morning's light. This year, however — principally, I
believe, because I had been up very late the previous
night — I struggled out of bed before dawn, and steered
for the Serpentine. A crescent moon was shining, and
stars studded the clear spaces between ominous patches
of cloud. A raw, moist wind was blowing, and on the
muddy streets were evident traces of a recent shower.
I had no notion that the gates of Kensington Gardens
were open so early ; and the sensation was novel as I
threaded the devious paths in morning dawn, and saw
tiie gas still alight along the Bayswater Road. A soli-
tary thrush was whistliog his Christmas c^rol as I strug-

A CHRISTMAS DIP. 107

gled over the inundated sward ; presently the sun threw
a few red streaks along the East, over the Abbey
Tower ; but, until I had passed the Serpentine bridge,
not a single human being met my gaze. There, how-
ever, I found some fifty men, mostly with a " sporting "
look about them. The ubiquitous boy was there, play-
ing at some uncomfortable game in the puddles round
the seats. The inevitable dog stood pensively by the
diving board ; and when, by-and-by, straggling all-
rounders came and took their morning header, the
quadruped rushed after them to the very edge of the
water, as though he had been a distinguished member of
the Humane Society. He shirked the element itself,
however, as religiously as though he had been one of
London's great unwashed. In the pause which pre-
ceded the race, I learned, from the Honorable Secretary
of the Serpentine Swimming Club, particulars of its his-
tory and of the race itself. For six years it had been
merely a club race ; but last year it was thrown open.
Strangely enough the race had never been won twice by
one man, though the competitors had been pretty much
the same every year. I also conversed with one of the
intending competitors, who showed me on his breast
with pardonable pride, five medals of the Royal Humane
Society, awarded for saving life in cases of danger from
drowning. The wearer was a Professor of Natation,
and told me that, among his pupils, he had an old lady
sixty-seven years of age, who had just commenced, and
was able to swim some twenty yards alread}^ The brave
old lady's example may do good ; though it is to be
hoped that she may not, at her time of life, be compelled
to exert her art for her own protection.

Names were now called, and fourteen competitors

1 08 M YS TIC L ONDOiV,

presented themselves — a motley gi'oup, clad for the
most part in trousers, horse-rug, and wide-awake, or,
more simply still, in Ulster frieze coat only. The group
of spectators had by this time grown to some hundreds,
nearly all directly interested in the noble art ; and the
dips became fast and frequent. Two flags were placed
in the water at the distance of 100 yards from the
diving board ; on this slender platform fourteen
shivering specimens of humanity ranged themselves,
and at the word of the starter plunged into the water
with that downward plunge so incomprehensible to the
uninitiated. A short, sharp struggle followed, the com-
petitors swimming with the sidelong movement and
obstreperous puffing which likens the swimmer so
closely to the traditional grampus. Eventually one of
the group is seen heading the others, and breasting the
water with calm and equable stroke in the old-fashioned
style. He reaches the flag a full yard before his
nearest antagonist. Numbers two and three, following,
are about half a yard apart. The others come in pretty
much in a group. All were picked men and there were no
laggards. The names of the winners were as follows : — •
I. Ains worth ; 2. Quartermain ; 3. H. Coulter. The
time occupied in the race was i min. 24 sec. Immedi-
ately after the race there was a rapid re-assumption
of rugs and Ulsters, though some of the more hardy
walked about in the garb of Nature, making everybody
shiver who looked at them. Finally, the prizes, con-
sisting of three handsome medals, were distributed by
Mr. H. Bedford, who, stood on a park seat and address-
ed a few genial words to each of the successful candi-
dates ; then, with a cheer, and frequent wishes for a
Merry Christmas, the assembly resolved itself into its
component parts.

BOXING-DAY ON THE STREETS. 109

1 had taken my accustomed cold tub before coming
out, yet each of these fourteen devoted men appeared to
me as a hero. They were not Herculean individuals :
several of, them were mere youths. Some of the all-
rounders were grey-headed men, but there was about
them all a freshness and ruddiness which showed that
their somewhat severe regimen agreed with them.
Fresh from such a Spartan exhibition, everything seemed
very late and Sybaritic in my domestic establishment,
and I could not help revolving in my mind the question,
what would one of these hardy all-the-year-rounders
think of me if he knew I was ever guilty of such a mal-
practice as breakfast in bed ? It is a novel method ; but
there are many worse ways of inaugurating the Great
Holiday than by taking — what it had been a novel sensa-
tion for me even to witness — a Christmas Dip in the
Serpentine*

CHAPTER XVII.

BOXING-DAY ON THE STREETS.

"D OXING-DAY in the London streets, and especially
a wet Boxing-day, can scarcely fail to afford us
some tableaux vivants illustrative of English metropoli-
tan life. In a metaphorical and technical sense, Box-
ing-day is always more or less "wet " — generally more,
and not less ; but this year the expression is used
climatically, and in its first intention. Christmas-eve of
the year about which I write was bright and springlike j
Christmas-day dismal, dark, and un Christmaslike ; but

xio - MYSTIC LONDON.

Boxing-day that year was essentially muggy, sloppy, driz-
zly, and nasty. A day to avoid the London streets if you
want to take a romantic Rosa-Matilda view of London
life ; but the very day of all others, if you wish to see real
London as it is. Boxing-day will inevitably be " wetter "
in every sense than usual this year, internally and exter-
nally. So let us commence our series of living pictures
at ten o'clock in the morning. Suppose we begin with
something that shall bear reference to the past festival
— the eve and the day of the Great Birth, recollect. See,
here is Grotto Passage^ Marylebone, and at its extremity
Paradise street — the names sound promising, but alas
for the reality ! We are going to turn for a moment
into the Marylebone Police Court, where Mr. D'Eyncourt
is dispensing summary justice to the accumulations of
the last two days. These are the people who have been
spending Christmas-eve, Christmas-day, and some por-
tion of Boxing-day already in the police-cells. Let us
take one as a typical case. Let that poor little eight-
year-old Arab step down from the dock and go off with
his mother, who, we hope, will take the magistrate's ex-
cellent advice, and keep the child from begging — that is
why he has spent Christmas in the cells — lest he be sent
to a school for eight years, and she have to pay for him
• — God help her ! — she does not look as though she could
afford very high terms. A bruised and bleeding woman,
not young or good-looking, enters the box with her head
bound up. Her lord and master confronts her in the
dock. It is the " old, old story." A drop of drink yes-
terday— the day of the Great Nativity, never forget — ■
series of " drops of drink" all day long ; and, at five
o'clock, just when gentility was beginning to think of
dinner, the kitchen poker was used with frightful effect

BOXING-DA Y ON THE STREE TS 1 1 1

A triangular cut over the right eye, and another in the
dangerous neighborhood of the left ear, administered
with that s)^mboI of domestic bliss, the kitchen poker,
sends the wife doubled up into a corner, with an infant
of two years old in her arms. The head of the family
goes out for a walk after his exertions. The woman lies
there bleeding until the neighbors hear her " mourning,"
as she terms it — the result being that the lord and mas-
ter's " constitutional " is cut short by a policeman, and
the happy pair are this morning separated for six
months, at the expiration of which period Paterfamilias
is to find security for another six months' good behavior.
Such, starred round with endless episodes of " drunk
and disorderly," " foul language," and so on, is our first
tableau this Boxing-day. It is not a pleasant one. Let
us pass on.

Along Oxford street, despite the Bank Holiday Act,
many shops are open, chiefly those devoted to the sale
of articles eatable, drinkable, and avoidable ; these last
being in the shape of chemists' shops, and shops for
Christmas presents — to be shunned by miserly old
bachelors. Let us turn into the British Museum and see
sensible, decorous Boxing-day there. At the corner of
Museum street there is a lively itinerant musician, evi-
dently French, who plays the fiddle until his bow
tumbles all to pieces, but he goes on playing with the
stick as though nothing had happened. When his in-
strument has come entirely to grief he turns to a clarionet,
which he carries under his arm, and plays " Mourir pour
la Patrie " with extraordinary vocal effect and irreverent
gestures. Punch-and-Judy is largely attended at the
other end ; Punch is kitchen-pokering his wife, too^
Uke the gentleman we have just left \ but we paes

112 MYSTIC LONDON,

in with the crowds to the Museum itself. Hahing a
moment in the reading-room, to jot down a few notes,
one is struck with the scanty show of students. They are
spending Boxing-day somewhere else. Passing through
the Httle knot of people who are permitted by special
order to come as far as the door of the reading-room, and
who evidently regard the readers as some curious sort of
animal exhibited for their special delectation — perhaps
the book-" worm " of which they have heard so much — ■
we go up the stairs, now thronged with crowds in
unwonted broadcloth and fragrant with the odor of the
inevitable orange. Next to the drinking fountain, which
is decidedly the chief attraction, comes the gorilla, and
then the extinct animals. One stout old lady, con-
templating the megatherium and mastodon, inquires in
what parts "them creeturs " are to be found, and seems
considerably damped by being informed that Nature has
been " out " of such articles for several seons. The
mummies, with the bones of their toes sticking out also
come in for a large share of admiration. There is
a good deal of rough flirtation going on j but, on the
whole, the pleasure is rather of a placid order, though
still contrasting favorably with the settled gloom visible
on the faces of the attendants in the various galleries.
How well we understand such gloom ! How utterly hate-
ful must that giant oak and overgrown extinct armadillo
be to a man condemned to spend a lifetime in their close
contemplation !

But let us pass on to the artistic Boxing-day keepers
at the National Gallery. The walk will take us through
the Seven Dials, and can scarcely fail to be suggestive.
It is now one o'clock, the traditional hour of dinner ;
and in Broad Street, St. Giles's, I see, for the first time

BOXING-DA y ON THE STREE TS. 113

to-day, the human barometer evidently standing at
"much- wet." A gentleman in a gray coat and red
comforter, who bears palpable signs of having been
more than once on his back, has just reached that per-
plexing point of inebriety when he can walk quickly or
run, but cannot stand still or walk steadily. He is pur-
sued by small children, mostly girls, after whom, every
now and then, he runs hopelessly, to their intense grat-
ification. The poultry and bird shops in the Seven
Dials are objects of some attraction, though they savor
too much of " business " to be in very great force. The
National Gallery is crowded with unaccustomed art
students. There is about the visitors a quiet air of do-
ing their duty, and being determined to go through with
it at any price. One brazen-faced quean speculates aud-
ibly— in fact, very audibly — as to which " picter " she
should choose if she had her " pick," and decent ma
trons pass the particularly High Art of the old masters
with half -averted gaze, as though they were not quite
sure of doing right in countenancing such exhibitions.
Hogarth's evergreen " Marriage k la Mode " is a great
centre of attraction, and the youngsters never tire of
listening, as " with weeping and with laughter still is
the story told " over and over again by their elders.
Gainsborough's likeness of Mrs. Siddons is also a great
favorite ; but perhaps the picture that attracts most
attention is Van Eyck's " John Arnolfini, of Lucca, and
his Wife." The gentleman wears a portentous hat,
which tickled the fancy of the Boxing-day people im-
mensely. There were great speculations too among
them as to whether the curious Tuscan pictures at the
top of the stairs were "needlework" or not. Still,
who shall say that these visitors were not the better for

8

114 MYSTIC LONDON.

their visits, surrounded as they were by forms of beauty
on every side, even if they did not examine them with
the eye of connoisseurs ?

Boxing-day on the river : The silent street is almost
deserted. There is no rush for the Express boat to-
day. It is literally the streets — muddier and sloppier
than the Thames itself — that are the attraction. Some
little boys are making the trip from Westminster to Lon-
don Bridge as a treat ; and it is an intense joke with
them to pretend to be dreadfully seasick. Boxing-day
in the city is synonymous with stagnation. It is a
howHng wilderness, with nobody to howl. On the Met-
ropolitan Railway I verily believe travellers were trip-
ping it like the little boys on board the penny boat.
And so theatre time draws on, and the interest of Box-
ing-day grows to a climax. Soon after five o'clock
groups furtively collect outside the play-houses, half-
ashamed of being so early, but gathering courage from
numbers to form the disorderly queue, so unlike that of
a Parisian theatre. Boxing-night in the theatres others
will describe. It is too much to expect of one whose
mission has been the whole day long on the streets.

CHAPTER XVIIL

THE VIGIL OF THE DERBY.

TN those days — happily now gone by — when public

strangulation was the mode in Merry England, there

was always an evident fascination appertaining to the

spot where, on the tiloiTow, some guilty wretch was" to

THE VIGIL OF THE DERBY.

115

expiate his crimes on the gallows. Long before the
erection of that elegant apparatus commenced, and gen-
erally on a Sunday evening, when decent citizens had
newly come from houses of God, where they had heard
the message of life, crowds began to collect on that cen-
tral spot in the heart* of the great City dedicated to sud-
den and violent death. The coming event seemed to
cast its shadow before ; and throughout the night the
roysterer or belated traveller made a detour to visit the
human shambles. I confess to having felt the attrac-
tion. I could not then bring myself to be present at
the strangulation proper ; so, as the nearest approach
to a " sensation," sometimes visited Newgate on the eve
of the victim elect's last morrow. In the same way,
being unfortunate enough to be London-bound on the
day of our great annual holiday, and having heard
graphic accounts of the Downs on the eve of the Derby,
I determined that year, as I could not go to the race by
day, to visit the race-course by night. Let me own the
soft impeachment : I am not a racing man — not in any
degree " horsey." When I do go to the Derby it is to
see the bipeds rather than the quadrupeds \ to empty
the hamper from Fortnum and Mason's, rather than to
study the " names, weights, and colors of the riders " on
the " c'rect card." If you prefer to have the sentiment
in Latin — and there is no doubt Latin does go much
farther than English — I am not one of those "' qtios
pulvere77i Olympiciim collegisse juvat,^'' except in so far
that " homo sum ; nihil hiimmium alienum a me putoT
It was to see humanity under a new aspect, I took the
last train to Epsom on the eve of the Derby.

In order to combine business with pleasure, and
economy with both, I took a third-class ticket at Victo-

1 1 6 MYSTIC L ONDON.

ria, and was fortunate enough to find a compartment
already partially occupied by a nigger troupe. In this,
which under ordinary circumstances I should have
avoided, I took my seat, and was regaled all the way
down -with choice morceaux from the repertoire of my
musical friends. The " talking man " of the party, too,
enlivened the proceedings by anxiously inquiring of the
porters at the different stations what they would take
in the way of refreshment, and issuing unlimited orders
to imaginary waiters on their behoof. It was a strange
sensation, being whirled away from home and bed down
to a wild heath towards midnight ; and as we neared
our destination, the air began to " bite shrewdly," and
the sky to look uncommonly like rain — a contretemps
which would have been fatal to my proposed experi-
ence. We had to change carriages at Sutton, and here
a sociable Aunt-Sally-man, struggling under the imple-
ments of his craft, sought to beguile me from my Afri-
can friends by offers of a shake-down in his tent, with
which he proposed to walk across from Ewell and erect,
instead of journeying on to Epsom. My Ethiopian
friends jumped at the proposal, and forthwith frater-
nized with Aunt Sally. I determined to follow out my
previous plans ; so having drunk to our next merry
meeting, we parted, ostensibly until to-morrow, but, I
fear, forever.

I had been led to expect " high jinks " at Epsom —
a sort of Carnival in the quiet town. Nothing could
hav6 been farther from the truth. The town, so far as
outward semblance went, was almost as quiet as ever.
A few sporting men thronged the bar of the principal
hotel, and stragglers hung about the low beer-shops ;
but there was nothing at all to indicate the imminence

THE VIGIL OF THE DERB Y. 117

of the great event. So I fell back on my usual expe-
dient of appl3nng to the executive, and found not only
an active and intelligent but exceedingly civil sergeant
of police, to whom I told my errand. He was pleased
with the novelty of the idea, and as he happened to be
then going the round of the town previously to visiting
the course, I cast in my lot with him for the night. We
first visited what he termed the " German Opera," on
Epsom Common. This is an encampment of organ-
grinders, hurdy-gurdy-players, German bands, etc., who
pitch their tents here instead of going to the Downs. It
was, however, rather late when we reached the spot
where these artists were bivouacking, and they had re-
tired for the night, so we could not form much idea of
them beyond their numbers, which seemed consider-
able, and their odor, which was unfragrant. Thence
we passed down a short alley to a railway arch, which
was aglow with many fires, and rang with the sounds of
many voices. Bidding me make no observation, what-
ever might be said^ and requesting me to try and look
like an officer in plain clothes, my cicerone led me into
the strange arcade,- which I certainly could not have
entered without his protection. Hundreds of men,
women, and boys were gathered in groups round coke
fires, some partaking of coffee, others singing, the ma-
jority sleeping. After satisfying himself that the fires
were legitimate ones, and not composed of broken
fences, my guide left this teeming hive unmolested.
We then steered for the course, not by the high road,
but skirting it along the fields. The policeman, like
myself, carried a stout stick, which really seemed to be
endowed with creative pc.wers that night. Wherever
he poked that staff—and he did poke it everywhere — a

Ii8 MYSTIC LONDON'.

human being growled, or snored, or cursed. Every
bush along the hedgerow bore its occupant — often its
group of four or five, sometimes a party of a dozen or a
score. One shed filled with carts yielded at least a
hundred, though the sergeant informed me it must have
been already cleared several times that evening, as he
had a file of men along the road, besides a cordon in-
side the Park palings, which border a great portion of
it. It is wdth these palings the tramps chiefly do mis-
chief, pulling them down to make fires along their
route. Wherever my guide found these, he trampled
the fires remorselessly out, and kicked the burning em-
bers over the sleepers in a manner that must have been
uncomfortable. The men submitted in comparative
silence; but the ladies — where there happened to be
any — exerted the privilege of their sex, and treated us
to some choice specimens of the vernacular. In one
case, a female cried out that he was kicking the fire
over the "childer;" and, sure enough, we found half-a-
dozen little ones huddled up asleep. The policeman
remonstrated with her for bringing them to such a
place ; but she informed us it was to " make their liv-
ing." In what way, she did not add. To us, it seemed
very much like reversing the process, and causing their
death. Fancy young children camping out on the road
to the Downs at midnight! Boys of thirteen and four-
teen abounded, sleeping in large groups along the
hedgerows, and sometimes out in the open fields, where
the dew lay thick.

At length, after many windings, we reached the
Downs. The white booths, following the direction of
the course in their sinuous lines, looked like stately
white marble streets and crescents in the dim, uncer-

THE VIGIL OF THE DERBY. ng

tain light of that hour which, between May 31 and
June I, is neither day nor night. Under the stands
and around the booths, tabernacling beneath coster-
mongers' l^arrows, and even lying out openly sub diOy
were still the hundreds of human beings. In one small
drinking booth was a sight the policeman said he had
never seen equalled in his twenty years' experience. A
long, narrow table ran down the centre, with benches on
each side. The table itself was occupied with recumbent
figures ; on the benches the sleepers sat, bending for-
ward over it, and under the benches sleepers sprawled
upon the grass. The whole of the front of the booth
was open, and exposed to the biting wind ; but there
they snored as calmly as though on eider-down. We
climbed the steps of the stand above the ring, and
waited for the day, which slowly broke to the song of
the lark and nightingale over that strange scene. With
the first suspicion of dawn the sleepers awoke and got
up j what for I cannot imagine. It was barely two
o'clock, and how they were going to kill the next twelve
hours I could not guess. Rise they did however, and
an itinerant vendor of coffee, who was literally up with
the lark, straightway began to drive a roaring trade. I
saw no stronger drink than this consumed ; nor did I
witness a single case of drunkenness during the whole
night. But this was before the Derby ! At this junc-
ture we were all surprised by the apparition of a han-
som-lamp toiling up the hill. Tvv^o adventurous gentle-
men froH' Liverpool, it appeared, had arrived at the
Euston Station, and insisted upon being driven at once
to an hotel on Epsom Downs. The Jehu, secure of a
fabulous fare, drove them accordingly ; and, of course,
had to drive them back again to Epsom — the hotels on

120 MYSTIC LONDON.

the Downs quietly but firmly declining to be knocked
up at that untimely hour even by gentlemen from Liver-
pool. As the sun showed his first up-slanting rays
above the horizon, with the morning star hanging im-
pertinently near, the two gipsy encampments began to
exhibit signs of life. The Zingari encamp exclusively
by themselves, and some picturesque specimens of the
male sex, looking remarkably like the lively photograph
of the Greek brigands, showed themselves on the out-
skirts. The ladies reserved themselves for later in the
day. My guide cautioned me not to attempt to enter
the encampment, as the men are dangerous, and their
position on the Downs a privileged one. It was only
when the tramps were trespassing, or evidently bent on
mischief, that they were disturbed. On the Downs
they were monarchs of all they surveyed.

When the sun was fairly up, and the morning mists
rolled away from those glorious Downs, I felt my
mission accomplished. I had seen the sun rise on
Epsom course. As it was many hours before a train
would return, and I still felt fresh, I resolved to give
the coup de grace to my night's adventure by walking
home — at least, walking to the radius of workmen's
trains. The vanguard of the Derby procession now
began to show strongly in the shape of the great un-
washed climbing the ridge of the hill by the paddock j
and I felt I should see some characteristic sights
along the road. Bidding good-bye, therefore, to my
guide at Epsom, I set out on foot along the now
populous road, mine being the only face turned
London-wards. Carts laden v/ith trestles and boards
for stands now began to be in force. By-and-bye the
well-known paper bouquets and outrageous head-gear

THE VIGIL OF THE DERBY. I2i

showed themselves as forming the cargo of coster-
monger's carts. The travellers were all chatty, many
of them chaffy. Frequent were the inquiries I had to
answer as to the hour and the distance to the course.
Occasionally a facetious gentleman anxiously inquired
whether it was all over, as I was returning. I be-
lieve the majority looked upon me as a harmless
lunatic, since I was travelling away from Epsom on
the Derby morning, and pitied me accordingly. An
Irishman aptly illustrated the genial character of
Hibernian chaff as compared with English. . " Good-
day to your honner ! " he said. " It does me good to
see your honner's happy face again ; " though, of
course, he had never seen it before. As I passed on
with a brief salutation, he took the trouble to run
after me, and slapping me on the shoulder, added, in
a beautiful brogue: "Wait a minnit ; I don't want
to ax you for anything, but only to tell you how glad
I am to see yer honner's happy face agin. Good-
mornin' ! "

So through Ewell, Cheam, and Morden, up to Toot-
ing ; the throng increasing at every mile. At Balham,
finding no train for an hour, I footed it again. I found
preparations for endless Aunt Sally already being made
on Clapham Common. Soon after six, I jumped into a
train on the London, Chatham, and Dover, and came
home " with the milk ; " having not only had a healthy
night's exercise — for the weather had all along been
splendid — but having added to my experiences of Lon-
don life one new "wrinkle" at least: I had seen the
life of St. Giles' kitchen and Bethnal Green lodging-
house a la campagne. What I had already seen under
the garish candlelight of the Seven Dials and Commer-

122 MYSTIC LOiVnOM.

cial road I saw gilded into picturesqueness by that
glorious and never-to-be-forgotten sunrise on Epsom
Downs which ushered in the Derby Day.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE WIFESLAYER's " HOME."

nPHEPvE is something very weird and strange in that
■^ exceptional avocation which takes one to-day to a
Lord Mayor's feast or a croquet tournament, to-morrow
to a Ritualistic service, next day to the home of a
homicide. I am free to confess that each has its
special attractions for me. I am very much disposed to
" magnify my office " in this respect, not from any fool-
ish idea that I am " seeing life," as it is termed, but
still from a feeling that the proper study of mankind is
man in all his varied aspects.

It need not always be a morbid feeling that takes
one to the scene of a murder or other horrible event,
though, as we w^ell know, the majority of those who
visit such localities do go out of mere idle curiosity.
It may be worth while, however, for some who look
a little below the surface of things, to gauge, as it
were, the genius loci, and see whether, in the influences
surrounding the spot and its inhabitants, there be any-
thing to afford a clue as to the causes of the crime.

In summing up the evidence concerning a certain
tragedy at Greenwich, where a man killed his wife by
throwing a knife, the coroner " referred to the horrible

THE WIFESL AVER'S '' HOME V 123

abode — a coal cellar — in which the family, nine in
number, had resided, which was unfit for human habita-
tion, and ought to have been condemned by the parish
authorities." Having seen and described in these
pages something of how the poor are housed in the
cellars of St. Giles' and Bethnal Green, and traced
the probable influences of herding together the criminal
and innocent in the low lodging-houses, it occurred to
me to visit the scene of this awful occurrence, and see
how far the account given before the coroner's jury was
correct.

With this view I took the train to Greenwich, and,
consulting the first policeman I met, was by him directed
to Roan Street as the scene of the tragedy. Roan
Street I found to be a somewhat squalid by-street, run-
ning out of Skelton Street, close — ^it seemed significantly
close — to the old parish church. One could not help
thinking of' the familiar proverb, "The nearer the
church, the farther from God." The actual locality is
called Munyard's Row, being some dozen moderate-
sized houses -in Roan Street, let out in lodgings, the
particular house in question being again, with a horrible
grotesqueness, next door but one to a beer-shop called
the " Hit or Miss ! " I expected to find Roan Street
the observed of all observers, but the nine days' wonder
was over since what Dickens called the " ink-widge."
Indeed, a homicide has ceased to be a nine days' won-
der now. This only happened on Saturday ; and when
I was there, on the following Wednesday, Roan Street
had settled down into its wonted repose. A woman
with a child was standing on the door-step, and, on my
inquiring if I could see the kitchen, referred me to Mrs.
Bristow at the chandler's shop, who farms the rent of

1 2 4 MYSTIC L ONDON.

these populous tenements ; for Munyard's Row is
peopled "from garret to basement," and a good way
underground too.

Mrs. Bristow, a civil, full-flavored Irishwoman, readily
consented to act cicerone, and we went through the pas-
sage into the back garden, where all the poor household
furniture of the homicide's late "home" was stacked.
It did not occupy a large space, consisting only of the
bedstead on which the poor woman sat when the fatal
deed was done, two ricketty tables, and two chairs.
These were all the movables of a family of nine. The
mattress was left inside — too horrible a sight, after what
had taken place, to be exposed to the light of day.

We passed — Honora Bristow and myself — with a
"gossip" or two, who had come to see what I was
after, into the back kitchen, for the wifeslayer had two
rooms en suite, though the family elected to occupy only
one. The floor of this apartment was either mother-
earth, or, if flagged, so grimed with filth as to be a very
fair resemblance of the soil. Here stood only that ter-
rible memento, the drenched mattress. In the front
kitchen — which, let me state, would have been palatial
in comparison with the Seven Dials or Spitalfields, had
it been only clean — there was very little light, for the
window, which was well down below the surface of the
pavement, had not a whole pane in it, and the broken
ones had been stuffed up with old rags, which were very
protuberant indeed. That window alone would show
that the menage had not been a judicious one.

" He was a quiet man," said Honora, " and gave
trouble to no one. He and his wife never had a word."
The gossips all believed that the story of the throwing
the knife was true, notwithstanding the medical evi-

THE WIFESL AVER'S "HOME r 125

dence went against it. The boy of twelve who provoked
the father to throw the knife, was evidently the incubus
of the wretched home. " Almost before the breath was
out of his mother, that boy was searching about the
bed to see if he could find any ha'pence," said Honora.
That boy was evidently not satisfactory. His evidence
was refused by the Coroner, because he could not read
or write. But then what had been the child's sur-
roundings ? They have been described above. The
man himself had a patriarchal family of seven, from a
girl of seventeen down to a baby of two, and all, as we
have seen, slept in one room, though there were two,
and though a bucket of whitewash would have made the
pair habitable, besides giving the lad some useful em-
ployment.

The father was of no particular occupation, picking
up odd jobs, and leaning largely to the shrimp trade.
He stood high in Honora Bristow's regards as having
regularly paid his is. 9^. a week for five years, or, at
least, being some z^s. behind now ; a sum which will
probably be covered by the chattels in the back garden.
The poor home was silent then. The mother lay calm-
ly in the dead house, after the post-mortem examination,
"terrible cut and hacked about," said the one gossip
who had ventured to go and see her quondam friend.
The father was in Maidstone Gaol. The little children
were being taken care of by their grandmother until
such time as the mother should have been buried, when
they would gravitate to the workhouse.

In the meantime the boy, cet. twelve, the cause of all
the mischief, disports himself in Munyard's Row as
though nothing had happened. Perhaps he is the most
difficult part of the problem ; but the whole question of

1 2 6 MYSTIC L ONDON.

the home is a puzzling one. The boy is evidently the
product of the home. It very much concerns the com-
munity that such produce should become extinct; and
therefore the sooner some improvements can be intro-
duced into such homes the better. In the first place,
there is decidedly too little light. Sunshine, under any
circumstances, would have been impossible there. The
advisability of human beings burrowing under ground
may be questioned, whether in cellars or genteel under-
ground kitchens.

Then again, one bedroom — nay, one bedstead — for
father, mother, and seven children ranging from seven-
teen to two is decidedly deficient. This sounds almost
too horrible to be true ; but I was careful to ascertain
that the eldest girl, though in domestic service in Green-
wich, slept at the " home." More horrible still is the
fact disclosed, that they had a second room, yet had not
the decency to use it. '"'' De 7nortuis nil nisi bonumT
They lived according to their light ; but they had very
little light, literally or figuratively. Surely we want to
teach our poor the simple rules of hygiene. One of the
gossips, a clean, healthy little woman, with a fine baby
at her breast, referred with pride to her poor kitchen,
identical in all respects, save dirt, with the home.

Then, again, there was one thing that struck me
forcibly, and that was the sort of qualified reprobation
with which these good gossips — really decent people in
their way — spoke of the habit of throwing knives.
Honora had once thrown one at her daughter of eight-
een, but never meant to do so again. And all this
under the bells of the old parish church of Greenwich
in the year of grace 1870 !

Clearly, however, the first question is what to do with

BATHING IN THE FAR EAST. 127

the boy, (st. twelve. Comporting himself as he did in
the face of the awful tragedy he had caused, this young
gentleman must clearly not be lost sight of, or it will be
the worse for himself and those with whom he is brought
into contact. Nay, in a few years, he will become a
centre of influence, and radiate around him another
such "home," worse, perhaps, than the first-
Let our Social Science so far break through the pro-
gramme it may have laid down as to touch on this very
appropriate subject of squalid homes, and its next sit-
ting may be a very useful one indeed.

CHAPTER XX.

BATHING IN THE FAR EAST.

A VISIONS of Oriental splendor and magnificence
float across the imagination at the mere mention
of the storied East. Soaring above all the routine
of ordinary existence and the commonplaces of his-
tory, that creative faculty within us pictures Pactolus
with its golden sands ; or recalls from the legendary
records of childhood the pomp of Aladdin's Princess
going to her luxurious bath ; or brings back to mind
the almost prosaic minuteness with which the Greek
poet describes the bath of Ulysses when he returned
from his wanderings. In the East the bath has ever
been an institution — not merely a luxury but a necessi-
ty ; and it is a proof of the eclectic tendencies of our
generation that we have domesticated here in the West
that great institution, the Ha?n77iam, or Turkish bath,

128 MYSTIC LONDON,

which the Romans were wise enough to adopt, aftei
their Eastern experience, more than two thousand years
ago. Of none of these Oriental splendors, however,
has the present narrative to tell. I ask those interested
in social questions to take a very early Sunday expedi-
tion to the East End of London, and eateh a glimpse
of those whom, after what I have to relate, it would be
libel to call the " Great Unwashed." We will look at
East London engaged in the interesting process of per-
forming its ablutions.

Very enjoyable is a Saturday afternoon stroll m Vic-
toria Park. Those gentlemen of London who sit at
hom^e at ease are apt to think of the East End as a
colleetion of slums, with about as much breathing space
for its congregated thousands as that supplied to the
mites in a superannuated Cheshire cheese. Let us pass
through Bethnal Green Road, and, leaving behind the
new Museum, go under a magic portal into the stately
acres which bear the name of our Sovereign. On our
right is the Hospital for Diseases of the Chest, of which
the foundation-stone was laid by the Prince Consort,
and the new wing of which our Orientals hope one day
to see opened by her Majesty in person. Most con-
vincing test of all is the situation of this Consumptive
Hospital — showing the salubrity of the Eastern breezes.
Inside the imposing gate the visitor will find extensive
cricket-grounds interspersed with broad pastures, whose
flocks are the reverse of Arcadian in hue. Cricket-
balls whiz about us like shells at Inkermann ; and the
suggestive " Thank you " of the scouts forces the passer-
by into unwonted activity as he shies the ball to the
bowler. Then there are roundabouts uncountable, and
gymnasia abundant. There are bosquets for the love

BA THING IN THE FAR EAST.

129

makers, and glassy pools, studded with islands innu-
merable, over which many a Lady of the Lake steers
her shallop, while Oriental sailor-boys canoe wildly
along. These are flower-beds which need not blush to
be compared with Kew or the Crystal Palace. But it
is not with such that we are now concerned. On one of
those same lakes over which, on Saturday evening,
sailors in embryo float their mimic craft — and one young
gentleman, slightly in advance of the rest, directs a very
miniature steamship — we see boards suggesting that
daily, from four to eight a. m., the Orientals may im-
merse themselves in the limpid and most tempting
waters. The depth, they are paternally informed, in-
creases towards the centre, buoys marking where it is
six feet ; so that our Eastern friends have no excuse for
suicide by drowning.

East London birds are early birds, and to catch them
at their bath you must be literally up with the lark.
Towards six o'clock is the most fashionable hour for
our metropolitan Pactolus ; and, as it is some miles dis-
tant from what can, by any stretch of courtesy, be call-
ed the West End, and as there are no workmen's trains
on a Sunday morning, a long walk or cab drive is in-
evitable for all who would witness the disporting of our
amphibious Orientals. Rising thus betimes on a recent
" Sunday morning before the bells did ring," I sped me
to the bathing pond, judiciously screened oif by shrubs
from the main path. It was between the appointed
hours that I arrived ; and, long before I saw anything,
the ringing laughter of the young East reached me
through the shrubs. Threading the path which led to
the lake, I found the water literally alive with men, boys,
and hobbledehoys, revelling in the water like young

9

130

MYSTIC LONDON.

hippopotami on the Nile. Boys were largely in the as-
cendant— boys from ten to fifteen years of age swam
like young Leanders, and sunned themselves on the
bank, in the absence of towels, as the preparative to
dressing, or smoked their pipes in a state of nature.
It is only just to say that while I remained, I heard
little if any language that could be called "foul." Very
free and easy, of course, were the remarks, and largely
illustrative of the vulgar tongue ; not without a share of
light chaff directed against myself, whose presence by
the lake-side puzzled my young friends. I received nu-
merous invitations to " peel " and have a dip ; and
one young urchin assured me in the most patronizing
way possible that he " wouldn't laugh at me " if I could
not get on. The language may not have been quite so
refined as that which I heard a few days before from
the young gentlemen with tall hats and blue ties at
Lord's j but I do say advisedly that it would more than
bear comparison with that of the bathers in the Serpen-
tine, where my ears have often been assailed with some-
thing far worse than anything I heard in East London.
In the matter of clothes, too, the apparel of our young
friends was indeed Eastern in its simplicity; yet they
left it unprotected on the bank with a confidence that
did honor to our common humanity in general, and to
the regulations of Victoria Park in particular. Swim-
ming in some sort was almost universal among the bath-
ers, showing that their visit to the water was not an iso-
lated event in their existence, but a constant as it is a
wholesome habit. The Oriental population were for
the most part apparently well fed ; and one saw there
lithe and active frames, either careering gracefully along
iu the old style of swimming, or adopting the new and

I

BATHING IN THE FAR FAST. 131

scientific method which causes the human form divine
to approach very nearly to the resemblance of a rather
excited grampus.

But inexorable Time warns the youthful bathers that
they must sacrifice to the Graces ; and some amusing
incidents occur during the process. Generally speaking,
though the amount of attire is not excessive, consider-
able effort in the way of pinning and hitching is required
to get thmgs in their proper places. A young gentle-
man was reduced to inexpressible grief, and held up to
the scorn of his fellow-bathers, by the fact that, in the
course of his al fresco toilette, one of his feet went
through his inexpressibles in an honorable quarter,
instead of proceeding by the proper route ; the error
interested his friends vastl}' — for they are as critical as
the most fastidious could be of any singularity in attire,
and they held the unfortunate juvenile in his embarrass-
ing position for a long time, to his intense despair,
until he was rescued from his ignoble position by some
grown-up friend. Then, the young East is prone to the
pleasures of tobacco. It was, I presume, before break-
fast with most of the bathers, and smoking under those
conditions is a trial even to the experienced. Some?
pale from their long immersion — for theirs was no tran-
sient dip — grew paler still after they had discussed the
pipe or cigar demanded of them by rigorous custom.
Fashion reigns supreme among the gamins of the East
as well as among the ladies of the West. Off they went,
however, cleaner and fresher than before — tacitly en-
dorsing by their matutinal amusement the motto that
has come down from the philosopher of old, and even
now reigns supreme from Bermondsey to Belgravia,that
" water is a most excellent thing."

132 MYSTIC L OND OJV.

The day may arrive perhaps when, having embanked
the Thames, we shall follow suit to the Seine and the
Rhine, by tenanting it with cheap baths for the many.
Until we do so, the stale joke of the " Great Unwashed "
recoils upon ourselves, and is no less symptomatic of
defective sanitary arrangements than the possibility of a
drought in Bermondsey. But we are forgetting our
bathers. They have gone, leaving the place to solitude
— some, I hope, home to breakfast, others out among
the flower-walks or on the greensward. It is a gloomy,
overcast, muggy, unseasonable July morning ; and the
civil attendant by the lakeside tells me that the gather-
ing has not been so large as usual. The young Orien-
tals— as is the custom of their race — love sunshine.
They get little enough of it. Heaven knows. The next
bright Sunday morning, any one who happens to be
awake between the hours mentioned, and who would
like to add to his experiences of metropolitan existence,
may do a worse thing, and see many a less pleasant
sight, than if he hailed a hansom and drove by the
principal entrance of Victoria Park to our Eastern
Bath.

CHAPTER XXI.

AMONG THE QUAKERS.

'' I ^HERE is no more engaging or solemn subject of

contemplation than the decay of a religious belief.

Right or wrong, by that faith men have lived and died,

perhaps for centuries; and one cannot see it pass out

AMONG THE QUAKERS, ^^^

from the consciousness of humanity without something
more than a cursory thought as to the reasons of its
decadence. Being led by exceptional causes to take a
more than , common interest in those forms of belief
which lie beyond the pale of the Church of England, I
was attracted by a notice in the public journals that on
the following morning the Society of Friends would
assemble from all parts of England and open a Con-
ference to inquire into the causes- which had brought
about the impending decay of their body. So, then, the
fact of such decay stood confessed. In most cases the
very last persons to realize the unwelcome truth are
those who hold the doctrines that are becoming effete,
Quakerism must, I felt, be in a very bad condition
indeed when its own disciples called together a con-
ference to account for its passing away. Neither men
nor communities, as a rule, act crowner's quest on their
own decease. That faith, it was clear, must be almost
past praying for which, disbelieving, as our modern
Quietism does, the efficacy of assemblies, and trusting
all to the inward illumination of individuals, should yet
summon a sort of Quaker (Ecumenical Council. I
thought I should like to probe this personal light
myself, and by inquiring of one or two of the members
of the body, learn what they thought of the matter. I
was half inclined to array myself in drab, and tiitoyer\}i\^
first of the body I chanced to encounter in my walks
abroad. But then it occurred to me how very seldom
one did meet a Quaker nowadays except in the " month
of Maying." I actually had to cast about for some
time before I could select from a tolerably wide and
heterogeneous circle of acquaintance two names of indi-
viduals belonging to the Society of Friends ; though I

134

MYSTIC LONDON.

could readily remember half a dozen of every other
culte, from Ultramontanes down to Jumpers. These
two, at all events, I would " interview," and so forestall
the conference with a little select synod of my own.

It was possible, of course, to find a ludicrous side to
the question ; but, as I said, I approached it seriously.
Sydney Smith, with his incorrigible habit of joking, ques-
tioned the existence of Quaker babies — a position which,
if proven, would, of course, at once account for the
diminution of adult members of the sect. It was true
I had never seen a Quaker infant ; but I did not theit-
fore question their existence, any more than I believed
postbo3^s and certain humble quadrupeds to be immor-
tal because I had never seen a dead specimen of either.
The question I acknowledged at once to be a social and
religious, not a physiological one. Why is Quakerism,
which has lived over two hundred years, from the days
of George Fox, and stood as much persecution a,s any
system of similar age, beginning to succumb to the in-
fluences of peace and prosperity ? Is it the old story of
Capua and Cannse over again ? Perhaps it is not
quite correct to say that it is now beginning to decline ;
nor, as a fact, is this Conference the first inquiry which
the body itself has made into its own incipient decay.
It is even said that symptoms of such an issue showed
themselves as early as the beginning of the eighteenth
century ; and prize essays have been from time to time
written as to the causes, before the Society so far fell
in with the customs of the times as to call a council for
the present very difficult and delicate inquiry. The first
prize essay by William Rountree attributes the falling
off to the fact that the early Friends, having magnified
a previously slighted truth — that of the Indwelling

AMONG THE QUAKERS. 135

Word — fell into the natural error of giving it an undue
place, so depriving their representations of Christian
doctrine of the symmetry they would otherwise have pos-
sessed, and influencing their own practices in such a
way as to contract the basis on which Christian fellow-
ship rests. A second prize essay, called " The Pecu-
lium," takes a still more practical view, and points out
in the most unflattering way that the Friends, by elimi-
nating from their system all attention to the arts, music,
poetry, the drama, &c., left nothing for the exercise of
their faculties save eating, drinking, and making money.
"The growth of Quakerism," says Mr. T. Hancock,
the author of this outspoken essay, " lies in its enthusi-
astic tendency. The submission of Quakers to the
commercial tendency is signing away the life of their
own schism. Pure enthusiasm and the pursuit of money
(which is an enthusiasm) can never coexist, never co-
operate ; but," he adds, " the greatest loss of power re-
served for Quakerism is the reassumption by the Catliolic
Church of those Catholic truths which Quakerism wms
separated to witness and to vindicate."

I confess myself, however, so far Quaker too, that I
care little for the written testimony of friends or foes.
I have, in all my religious wanderings and inquiries,
adopted the method of oral examination ; so I found
myself on a recent November morning speeding off by
rail to the outskirts of London to visit an ancient Quak-
er lady whom I knew very slenderly, but whom I had
heard was sometimes moved by the spirit to enlighten a
Uttle suburban congregation, and was, therefore, I felt,
the very person to enlighten me too, should she be
thereunto moved. She was a venerable, silver-haired
old lady, clad in the traditional dress of her sect, and

136 MYSTIC LONDON.

looking very much like a living representation of Eliza-
beth Fry. She received me very cordially; though I
felt as if I were a fussy innovation of the nineteenth
century breaking in upon the sacred, old-fashioned quiet
of her neat parlor. She " thee'd and thou'd " me to my
heart's content : and — to summarize the conversation I
held with her — it was to the disuse of the old phrase-
ology and the discarding of the peculiar dress that she
attributed most of the falling off which she was much
too shrewd a woman of the world to shut her eyes to.
These were, of course, only the outward and visible
signs of a corresponding change within ; but this was
why the Friends fell off, and gravitated, as she confess-
ed they were doing, to steeple-houses, water-dipping,
and bread-and-wine-worship. She seemed to me like a
quiet old Prophetess Anna chanting a " Nunc Dimittis "
of her own on the passing away of her faith. She would
be glad to depart before the glory had quite died out.
She said she did not hope much from the Conference,
and, to my amazement, rather gloried in the old irrever-
ent title given by the Independents to her forefathers
from their " quaking and trembling " when they heard the
Word of God, though she preferred still more the older
title of " Children of the Light." She was, in fact, a
rigid old Conservative follower of George Fox, from the
top of her close-bordered cap to the skirts of her grey
silk gown. I am afraid my countenance expressed in-
credulity as to her rationale of the decay ; for as I rose
to go, she said, " Thou dost not agree friend, with what
I have said to thee — nay, never shake thy head ; it would
be wonderful if thou didst, when our own people don't.
Stay ; I'll give thee a note to my son in London, though
he will gainsay mtich of what I have told thee." She

AMONG THE QUAKERS.

137

gave me the letter, which was just what I wanted, for 1
felt I had gained little beyond a pleasant experience of
old-world life from my morning's jaunt. I partook of
her kindly hospitality, was shown over her particularly
cosy house, gardens, and hothouses, and meditated, on
my return journey, upon many particulars I learnt for
the first time as to the early history of Fox ; realizing
what a consensus there was between the experiences of
all iUuminati. I smiled once and again over the quaint
title of one of Fox's books which my venerable friend
had quoted to me — viz., " A Battle-door for Teachers
and Professors to learn Plural and Singular. You to
Mafty, and Tkou to One; Singular, One, Thou ; Plural,
Many, l'<??/." While so meditating, my cab deposited
me at the door of a decidedly " downy " house at the
West End, where my prospective friend was practising
in I will not mention which of the learned professions.
Both the suburban cottage of the mother and the Lon-
don minage of the son assured me that they had thriven
on Quakerism j and it was only then I recollected that
a poor Quaker was as rare a personage as an infantile
member of tHe Society.

The young man — who neither in dress, discourse,
nor manner differed from an ordinary English gentle-
man— smiled as he read his mother's lines, and, with a
decorous apology for disturbing the impressions which
her discourse might have left upon me, took precisely
the view which had been latent in my own mind as to
the cause of the Society's decay. Thoroughly at one
with them still on the doctrine of the illuminating
power of the Spirit in the individual conscience, he
treated the archaic dress, the obselete phraseology, the
obstinate opposition to many innocent customs of the

1^8 MYSTIC LONDON.

age, simply as anachronisms. He pointed with pride
to the fact that our greatest living orator was a member
of the Society ; and claimed for the underlying prin-
ciple of Quakerism — namely, the superiority of a con-
science void of offence over written Scripture or formal
ceremony — the character of being in essence the broad-
est creed of Christendom. Injudicious retention of cus-
toms which had grown meaningless had, he felt sure,
brought down upon the body that most fatal of all in-
fluences— contempt. " You see it in your own Church,"
he said. " There is a school which, by reviving obso-
lete doctrines and practices, will end in getting the
Church of England disestablished, as it is already dis-
integrated. You see it even in the oldest religion of
all — ^Judaism. You see, I mean, a school growing into
prominence and power which discards all the accumula-
tions of ages, and by going back to real antiquity at
once brings the system more into unison with the cen-
tury, and prevents that contempt attaching to it which
will accrue wherever a system sets its face violently
against the tone of current society." He thought the
Conference quite unnecessary. " There needs no ghost
come from the dead to tell us that, Horatio," he said
cheerily. " They will find out that Quakerism is not a
proselytizing religion," he added, " which, of course, we
knew before. They will point to the fashionable at-
tire, the gold rings, and lofty chignons of our younger
sisters as direct defiance of primitive custom. I am un-
orthodox enough " — and he smiled as he used that
word — " to think that the attire is more becoming to my
younger sisters, just as the Society's dress is to my dear
mother." That young man, and the youthful sisters he
told me of. stood as embodied answers to the question

PENNY READINGS. 1 3^

I had proposed to myself. They were outward and vis-
ible evidences of the doctrine of Quaker "develop-
ment." The idea is not dead. The spirit is living
still. It is the spirit that underlies all real religion —
namely, the personal relation of the human soul to God
as the source of illumination. That young man was as
good a Quaker at heart as George Fox or William Penn
themselves; and the "apology" he offered for his
transformed faith was a better one than Barclay's own.
I am wondering whether the Conference will come to
anything like so sensible a conclusion as to why Qua-
kerism is declining.

CHAPTER XXII.

PENNY READINGS.

"\ T 7H0 has ever penetrated beneath the surface of
clerical society — meaning thereby the sphere of
divinities (mostly female) that doth hedge a curate of a
parish — without being sensible of the eligibility of
Penny Readings for a place in Mystic London ? When
the Silly Season is at its very bathos ; when the mon-
ster gooseberries have gone to seed and the showers of
frogs ceased to fall ; after the matrimonial efforts of
Margate or Scarborough, and before the more decided
business of the Christmas decorations, then there is
deep mystery in the penetralia of every parish. The
great scheme of Penny Readings is being concocted,
and all the available talent of the district — all such as

I40 MYSTIC LONDON.

is " orthodox " and " correct " — is laid under contribu-
tion.

It is true to a proverb that we English people have a
knack of doing the best possible things in the worst
possible way ; and that not, unfrequently, when we do
once begin doing them we do them to death. It takes
some time to convince us that the particular thing is
worth doing at all ; but, once persuaded, we go in for it
with all our British might and main. The beard-and-
mustache movement was a case in point. Some years
ago a mustache was looked upon by serious English peo-
ple as decidedly reckless and dissipated. A beard was fit
only for a bandit. Nowadays, the mildest youth in the
Young Men's Christian Association may wear a mus-
tache without being denounced as " carnal," and pater-
familias revels in the beard of a sapeur, no misopogon
daring to say him nay. To no " movement," however,
does the adage " Vires acqiiirit eundo " apply more
thoroughly than to that connected with " Penny Read-
ings." Originally cropping up timidly in rustic and
suburban parishes, it has of late taken gigantic strides,
and made every parish where it does not exist, rural or
metropolitan, very exceptional indeed. There was a
sound principle lying at the bottom of the movement,
in so far as it was designed to bring about a fusion of
classes ; though, perhaps, it involved too much of an
assumption that the " working man " had to be lectured
to, or read to, by his brother in purple and fine linen.
Still the theory was so far sound. Broad cloth was to
impart to fustian the advantages it possessed in the
way of reading, singing, fiddling, or what not ; and that
not gratuitously, which would have offended the work-
ing man's dignity, but for the modest sum of one penny,

PENNY READINGS.

141

which, whilst Lazarus was not too poor to afford, Dives
condescended to accept, and apply to charitable pur-
poses.

Such being, in brief, the theory of the Penny Read-
ing moveiTient, it may be interesting to see how it is
carried out in practice. Now, in order to ascertain this,
I availed myself of several opportunities afforded by the
commencement of the Penny Reading season, which
may be said to synchronize very nearly with the advent
of London fogs, and attended the opening of the series
in several widely different localities. In describing my
experiences it would perhaps be invidious to specify the
exact locality where they were gathered. I prefer to
collate those experiences which range from Campden
Hill to Camden Town inclusive. Amid many distin-
guishing traits there are common elements traceable in
all, which may enable us to form some estimate of the
working of the scheme, and possibly to offer a few words
of advice to those interested therein.

In most cases the Penny Readings are organized by
the parochial clergy. We will be orthodox, and consider
them so to be on the present occasion. In that case,
the series would probably be opened by the incumbent
in person. Some ecclesiastical ladies, young and middle-
aged, who, rightly or wrongly, believe their mission is
music, and to whom the curate is very probably an at-
traction, aid his efforts. Serious young men read, and
others of a more mundane turn of mind sing doleful
" comic" songs, culled from the more presentable of
the music-hall r&pertoire. In many cases skilled
amateurs or professionals lend their valuable assistance ;
and it is not too much to say that many a programme is
presented to the audience — ay, and faithfully carried out

142 MYSTIC LONDON.

too — which would do credit to a high-priced concert-
room. But, then, who make up the audience? Gradu-
ally the " penny " people have been retiring into the
back-ground, as slowly but as surely as the old-fashioned
pits at our theatres are coyly withdrawing under the
boxes to make way for the stalls. The Penny Readings
have been found to " draw " a higher class of audience
than those for whom they were originally intended. The
curate himself, if unmarried, secures the whole spinster-
hood of the parish. His rendering of the lines, " On
the receipt of my mother's picture out of Norfolk," is
universally acknowledged to be " delightful ; " and so,
in course of time, the Penny Readings have been found
to supply a good parochial income ; and the incumbent,
applying the proceeds to some local charity, naturally
wishes to augment that income as much as possible.
The consequence is that the penny people are as com-
pletely nowhere at the Penny Readings as they are in the
free seats at their parish church. The whole of the
body of the room is " stalled off," so to say, for sixpenny
people, and the penny folk are stowed away anywhere.
Then, again, in several programmes I have been at the
pains to analyze, it is palpable that, whilst the bulk of
the extracts fire over the heads of the poor people, one
or two are inserted which are as studiously aimed at
them as the parson's remarks in last Sunday's sermon
against public-house loafing. Still " naming no names,"
I attended some readings where one of the clergy read
a long extract from Bailey's " Festus," whilst he was
succeeded by a vulgar fellow, evidently put in for " the
gods," who delivered himself of a parody on Ingoldsby,
full of the coarsest slang— nay, worse than that,, abound-
ing in immoralities which, I hope, made the parochial

PENNY READINGS. 14

clerg}^ sit on thorns, and place the reader on their
** Index Expurgatorius " from henceforth.

Excellent in its original design, the movement is
obviously degenerating into something widely different.
First, I would say, Let your Penny Readings be really
Penny Readings, and not the egregious liiciis a non they
now are. If there is any distinction, the penny people
should have the stalls, and then, if there were room, the
" swells " (I must use an offensive term) could come in
for sixpence, and stand at the back. But there should
be no diiference at all. Dives and Lazarus should sit
together, or Dives stop away if he were afraid his fine
linen may get soiled. Lazarus, at all events, must not
be lost sight of, or treated to second best. The experi-
ment of thus mingling them has been tried, I know, and
succeeds admirably. Dives and Lazarus do hobnob;
and though the former occasionally tenders a silver coin
iox\i\'S> entree^ he does not feel that he is thereby entitled
to a better seat. The committee gets the benefit of
his liberality ; and when the accounts are audited in the
spring, Lazarus is immensely pleased at the figure his
pence make-. Then, again, as to the quality of the
entertainment. Let us remember Lazarus comes there
to be elevated. That was the theory we set out with —
that we, by our reading, or our singing, or fiddling, or
tootle-tooing on the cornet, could civilize our friend in
fustian. Do not let us fall into the mistake, then, of
descending to his standard. We want to level him up
to ours. Give him the music we play in our own draw-
ing-rooms ; read the choice bits of fiction or poetry to
his wife and daughters which we should select for our
own. Amuse his poor little children with the same
innocent nonsense with which we treat our young people.

144 MYSTIC LONDON.

Above all, don't bore liim. I do not say, never' be
serious, because it is a great mistake to think Lazarus
can only guifaw. Read " The Death of Little Nell " or
of Paul Dombey, and look at Mrs. Lazarus's eyes. Read
Tom Hood's " Song of the Shirt," and see whether the
poor seamstress out in the draughty penny seats at the
back appreciates it or not. I did hear of one parish at
the West End — the very same, by the way, I just now
commended for sticking to the " penny " system — where
Hood's " Nelly Gray," proposed to be read by the son
of one of our best known actors, was tabooed as " un-
edifying." Lazarus does not come to be " edified," but
to be amused. If he can be at the same time instruct-
ed, so much the. better; but the bitter pill must be
highly gilded, or he will pocket his penny and spend it
in muddy beer at the public-house. If the Penny
Reading can prevent this — and we see no reason why it
should not — it will have had a mission indeed. Finally,
I feel sure that there is in this movement, and lying only
a very little way from the surface, a wholesome lesson
for Dives too ; and that is, how little difference there is,
after all, between himself and Lazarus. I have been
surprised to see how some of the more reche?'che " bits"
of our genuine humorists have told upon the penny
people, and won applause which the stalest burlesque
pun or the nastiest music-hall inanity would have failed
to elicit. Lazarus must be represented on the platform
then, as well as comfortably located in the audience.
He must be asked to read, or sing, or fiddle, or do
whatever he can. If not, he will feel he is being read
at, or sung to, or fiddled for, and will go off to the Mag-
pie and Stump, instead of bringing missus and the little
ones to the " pa'son's readings," Let the Penny Read

DAKIVIXISM ON THE DEVIL. 14^

ing teach us the truth — and how true it is — that we are
all " working men." What matters it whether we work
with head or with hand — with brain or muscle ?

CHAPTER XXIII.

DARWINISM ON THE DEVIL.

TT has been said — perhaps more satirically than seri-
ously— that theology could not get on without its
devil. Certain it is that wherever there has been a vivid
realization of the Spirit of Light, there, as if by way of
antithesis, there has been an equally clear recognition
of the Power of Darkness. Ormuzd — under whatever
name recognized — generally supposes his opponent
Ahriman ; and there have even been times, as in the
prevalence of the Manichean heres)'", when the Evil
Spirit has been affected in preference to the good —
probably only another way of saying that morals have
been held subordinate to intellect. But I am growing
at once prosy and digressive.

The announcement that the " Liberal Social Union "
would devote one of their sweetly heretical evenings at
the Beethoven Rooms, Harley Street, to an examination
of the Darwinian development of the Evil Spirit, was
one not to be scorned by an inquirer into the more
eccentric and erratic phases of theology. Literary
engagements stood in the way — for the social heretics
gather on a Friday — but come what might, I would heai
them discuss diabolism. Leaving my printer's devil to
indulge in typographical errors according to his own

146 MYSTIC LONDON.

sweet will (and I must confess he did wander), I pre-
sented myself, as I thought in good time, at the portals
of the Harley Street room, where his Satanic Majesty
was to be heretically anatomized. But, alas ! I had not
calculated aright the power of that particular potentate
to " draw." No sooner had I arrived at the cloak-room
than the very hats and umbrellas warned me of the num-
ber of his votaries. Evening Dress was "optional;"
and I frankly confess^ at whatever risk of his displeasure,
that I had not deemed Mephistopheles worthy of a swal-
low-tailed coat. I came in the garb of ordinary life ;
and at once felt uncomfortable when, mounting the
stairs, I was received by a portly gentleman and an
affable lady in violent tenue de soir. The roOm was
full to the very doors ; and as soon as I squeezed into
earshot of the lecturer (who had already commenced his
discourse) I was greeted by a heterodox acquaintance
in elaborate dress-coat and rose-pink gloves. Experi-
ence in such matters had already told me — and there-
upon I proved it by renewed personal agony — that an
Englishman never feels so uncomfortable as when
dressed differently from his compeers at any kind of

social gathering. Mrs. T asks you to dinner, and

you go clad in the correct costume in deference to the
prandial meal, but find all the rest in morning dress.

Mrs. G. , on the contrary, sends you a rollicking

note to feed with a few friends, — no party; and you go
straight from office to find a dozen heavily-got-up people
sniggering at your frock coat and black tie. However,
as I said, on this occasion the lecturer. Dr. Zerffi, was
in the thick of what proved to be a very attractive lee
ture ; so I was not the observed of all observers foi
more than two or three minutes, and was able to give

DARWINISM ON THE DEVIL. 147

him my whole attention as soon as I had recovered
from my confusion. Dr. Zerffi said : —

Dr. Darwin's theory of evolution and selection has
changed our modern mode of studying the inorganic
and organic phenomena of nature, and investigating the
realities of truth. His theory is not altogether new,
having been first proclaimed by Leibnitz, and followed
up with regard to history by Giovanni Battista Vico.
Oken and Goethe amplified it towards the end of the
last, and at the beginning of the present century. Dar-
win, however, has systematized the theory of evolution,
and now the branches of human knowledge can only be
advantageously pursued if we trace in all phenomena,
whether material or spiritual, a beginning and a gradual
development. One fact has prominently been estab-
lished, that there is order in the eternal change, that
this order is engendered by law, and that law and order
are the criterions of an all-wise ruling Spirit pervading
the Universe. To this positive spirit of law a spirit of
negation, an element of rebellion and mischief, of
mockery and selfishness, commonly called the Devil,
has been opposed from the beginning.

It appeared, till very lately, as though God had cre-
ated the world only for the purpose of amusing the
Devil, and giving him an abundance of work, all directed
to destroying the happiness of God's finest creation —
man. Treating the Devil from a Darwinian point of
view, we may assert that he developed himself from the
protoplasm of ignorance, and in the gloomy fog of fear
aiid superstition grew by degrees into a formidable
monster, being changed by the overheated imaginations
of dogmatists into a reptile, an owl, a raven, a dog, a
wolf, a lion, a centaur, a being half monkey, half man,

148 MYSTIC LONDON.

till, finally, he became a polite and refined human
being.

Man once having attained a certain state of con-
sciousness, saw sickness, evil, and death around him,
and as it was usual to assign to every effect some tan-
gible cause, man developed the abstract notion of evil
into a concrete form, which changed with the varying
impressions of climate, food, and the state of intellectual
progress. To the white man the Devil was black, and
to the black man white. Originally, then, the Devil
was merety a personification of the apparently destructive
forces of nature. Fire was his element. The Indians
had their Rakshas and Uragas, the Egyptians their
Typhon, and the Persians their Devas. The Israelites
may claim the honor of having brought the theory of
evil into a coarse and sensual form, and the Christians
took up this conception, and developed it with the help
of the Gnostics, Plato, and the Fathers dogmatically into
an entity.

I shall not enter on a minute inquiry into the origin
of this formidable antagonist of common sense and real
piety ; I intend to take up the three principal phases
of the Devil's development, at a period when he already
appears to us as a good Christian Devil, and always
bearing in mind Mr. Darwin's theory of evolution, I
shall endeavor to trace spiritually the changes in the
conceptions of evil from the Devil of Luther to that of
Milton, and at last to that of Goethe.

The old Jewish Rabbis and theological doctors were
undoubtedly the first to trace, genealogically, the pedi-
gree of the Christian Devil in its since general form. If
we take the trouble to compare chap. i. v. 27 of Genesis
with chap. ii. v. 21, we will find that two distinct crea-

DARWINISM ON THE DEVIL. 14^^

tions of man are given. The one is different from the
other. In the first instance we have the clear, indis-
putable statement, " So God created man in his own
image : " and to give greater force to this statement
the text goes on, " in the image of God created he him;
male and female created he them." Both man and
woman were then created. Nothing could be plainer.
But as though no creation of man had taken place at
all, we find, chap. ii. v. 7 : " And the Lord formed man
of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils
the breath of life." This was evidently a second man,
differently created from the first, who is stated to have
been made *^ in the image of God himself." This sec-
ond creature was entrusted with the nomination and
classification of all created things ; that is, with the
formation of language, and the laying down of the first
principles of botany and zoology. After he had per-
formed this arduous task it happened that "for Adam
there was not found an help meet for him " (verse 20),
and chap. ii. v. 21 tells us, "The Lord God caused a
deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept ; and He
took one of "his ribs and closed up the flesh instead
thereof:" and verse 22, "And of the rib which the
Lord God had taken from man made He a woman, and
brought her unto man." Adam then joyfully exclaims
(verse 23), " This is now bone of my bones, and flesh
of my flesh." This cannot but lead to the conclusion
that this woman was an altogether different creature
from the first. The contradiction was most ingeniously
explained by the learned Jewish Rabbis, who consid-
ered the first woman the organic germ from which the
special Hebrew-Christian devils were evolved. The
Rabbis discovered that the name of the first woman

1^0 MYSTIC LONDON.

was"Lilith"* (the nightly); they knew positively — ■
and who can disprove their assertion ? — that she was
the most perfect beauty, more beautiful than Eve ; she
had long waving hair, bright eyes, red lips and cheeks,
and a charmingly finished form and complexion ; but
having been created at the same moment as the first
man, and like him, in the image of God, she refused to
become man's wife ; she objected to being subordinate
to the male part of creation — she was, in fact, the first
strong-minded woman, claiming the same rights as man,
though a woman in body and form. Under these cir-
cumstances the existence of the human race was
deemed to be an impossibility, and therefore the Lord
had to make good his error, and He created Eve as the
completing part of man. The first woman left her co-
equally created male, and was changed into an enor-
mous, most beautiful, and seducing " She Devil," and
her very thoughts brought forth daily a legion of devils
— incarnations of pride, vanity, conceit, and unnatural-
ness. Happily these devils were so constituted that
they devoured one another. But in their rage they
could take possession of others, and more especially
entered little children — boys under three days old, girls
under twenty days — and devoured them. This myth,
by means of evolution and the law of action and re-
action, engendered the further legend about the exist-
ence of three special angels who acted as powerful an-
tidotes to these devils, and whose names, " Senoi, San-
senoi, and Sanmangeloph," if written on a piece of

*The word is found in Isaiah xxxiv. 14. Translated in the
Vulgate as " Lamia ; " in Luther's translation as " Kobold ; " in
the English version as "screech-owl ; " and in others as " an ugly
night-bird."

p

DAR WINISM ON THE DE VIL. i ^ i

parchment suspended round the neck of children af-
forded certain protection against them.

The origin of the Devil may thus be traced to the
first vain contempt for the eternal laws of nature. The
woman, refusing to be a woman, engenders devils ; the
man, trying to be God, loses paradise and his inno-
cence, for the element of the supernatural intruded
upon liim and abstracted his thoughts from this earth.
These were the half idealistic and half realistic ele-
ments from which the three greatest spiritual incarna-
tions of the Evil Spirit sprung up. Luther took the
Evil Spirit as a bodily entity, with big horns, fiery
eyes, a reddish, protruding tongue, a long tail, and the
hoof of a horse. In this latter attribute we trace at
once the Kentaur element of ancient times. Through
nearly one thousand three hundred years from Tertul-
lian and Thaumaturgus down to Luther, every one was
accustomed to look upon life as one great battle witn
tens of thousands of devils, assaulting, harassing, an-
noying, and seducing humanity. All fought, quarrelled,
talked, and wrestled with the Devil. He was more
spoken of in the pulpits of the Christian Churches,
written about in theological and scientific books, than
God or Christ. All misfortunes were attributed to him.
Thunder and lightning, hailstorms and the rinderpest,
the hooping cough and epileptic fits were all the Devil's
work. A man who suffered from madness was said to
be possessed by a legion of Evil Spirits. The Devil
settled himself in the gentle dimples of a pretty girl
with the same ease and comfort as in the wrinkles of
an old woman. Everything that was inexplicable was
evil. Throughout the Middle Ages the masses and the
majority of their learned theological teachers believed

152 MYSTIC LONDON.

the Greek and Latin classics were inspired by Evil
Spirits ; that sculptures or paintings, if beautiful, were
of evil ; that all cleverness in Mathematics, Chemistry,
or Medicine proved the presence of the corrupting Evil
Spirit working in man. Any bridge over a chasm or a
rapid river was the work of the Devil ; even the most
beautiful Gothic cathedrals, like those of Cologne and
St. Stephen at Vienna were constructed by architects
who served their apprenticeship in the infernal regions.
The Devil sat grinning on the inkstands of poets and
learned men, dictating to the poor deluded mortals, as
the price for their souls, charming love-songs or deep
theological and philosophical essays. It was extremely
dangerous during this period of man's historical evolu-
tion to be better or wiser than the ignorant masses.
Learning, talent, a superior power of reasoning, love for
truth, a spirit of inquiry, the capacity of making money
by clever trading, an artistic turn of mind, success in
life, even in the Church, were only so many proofs that
the soul had been sold to some dwarfish or giant mes-
senger from Lucifer, who could appear in a thousand
different forms. Man was, since his assumed Fall, the
exclusive property of the coarse and vulgar conception
of the Evil Spirit. Luther was full of these ideas, he
was brought up in this belief, and though he uncon-
sciously felt that the Devil ought to be expelled from
our creed, he did not dare to attempt the reform of hu-
manity by annihilating the mischief-maker : he could
not rob man of his dearest spiritual possession ; had he
thought of consigning the Devil to the antediluvian
period of our moral and social formation, he never
could have succeeded in his reform. The Devil, in
fact, was his strongest helpmate ; he could describe the

DARWINISM ON THE DEVIL. 1^3

ritual of the Romish Church as the work of the Evil
Spirit, produced to delude mankind. The Devil had
his Romish prayers, his processions, his worship of
relics, his remission of sins, his confessional, his infer-
nal synods ; he was to Luther an active, rough, and
material incarnation of the roaring lion of the Scrip-
tures in the shape of the Romish Church, walking
about visibly, tangibly, bodily amongst men, devouring
all who believed in the Pope, and who disbelieved in
this stupid phantom of a dogmatically blinded imagina-
tion.

The Evolution-theory may be clearly traced in the
two next conceptions : Milton's Satan and Goethe's
Mephistopheles. They differ as strongly as the periods
and the poems in which they appear. Milton's Satan
loses the vulgar flesh and bone, horn and hoof nature
— he is an epic character ; whilst Goethe's Devil is an
active dramatic entity of modern times. Milton's rep-
resentative of evil is a very powerful conception — it is
evil m abstracto ; whilst Mephistopheles is evil in con-
creto — the intelligible, tangible Devil, evolved by the
power of selection from an antediluvian monster, and
transformed through a civilizing process of at least six
thousand years into its present form. Milton's Satan
is a debased intellect who in his boundless ambition is
still a supernatural being. Mephistopheles is the incar-
nation of our complicated modern social evils, full of
petty tricks and learned quotations ; he piously turns
up his eyes, he lies, doubts, calumniates, seduces, philoso-
phizes, sneers, but all in a polite and highly educated
way; he is a scholar, a divine, a politician, a diplomatist.
Satan is capable of wild enthusiasm, he sometimes remem-
bers his bright sinless past; "from the lowest deep,"

1^4 MYSTIC LONDON.

he yearns, " once more to lift himself up, in spite of fate,
nearer to his ancient seat ;" — he hopes to re-enter heav-
en, " to purge off his gloom ; " some remnant of heavenly
innocence still clings to him, for though fallen^ he is still
an afigel ! Mephistopheles in his real nature is without
any higher aspirations, he argues with a sarcastic smile
on his lips, he is ironical with sophisticated sharpness.
Satan has unconsciously gigantic ideas, he is ready to
wrestle with God for the dominion of heaven. Mephis-
topheles is perfectly conscious of his littleness as op-
posed to our better intellectual nature, and does evil
for evil's sake. Satan is sublime through the grandeur
of his primitive elements, pride and ambition. Me-
phistopheles is only grave in his pettiness ; he does not
refuse an orgie with drunken students, indulges in jokes
with monkeys, works miracles in the witch's kitchen,
delights in the witch's " one-time-one ; " distributes little
tracts "to stir up the witch's heart with special fire."
Satan has nothing vulgar in him : he is capable of melan-
choly feelings, he can be pathetic and eloquent. Mephis-
topheles laughs at the stupidity of the world, and at his
own. Satan believes in God and in himself, whilst Me-
phistoples is the " Spirit that denies ; " he beheves
neither in God nor in heaven nor in hell ; he does not
believe in his own entity — he is no supernatural, fan-
tastic being, but man incarnate : he is the evil part of a
good whole, which loses its entity when once seen and
recognized in its real nature ; for Mephistopheles in
reality is our own ignorant, besotted animal nature, cul-
tivated and developed at the expense of our intellectual
part.

Luther's devil is the outgrowth of humanity in long-
clothes. Man, ignorant of the forces of the Cosmos,

DARWINISM ON THE DEVIL. 155

blinded by theological dialectics and metaphysical sub-
tleties, incapable of understanding the real essence of
our moral and intellectual nature, philosophically un-
trained to observe that evil is but a sequence of the dis-
turbed balance between our double nature — spirit and
matter — attributed all mischief in the intellectual as
well as in our social spheres to an absolute powerful
being who continually tormented him.

Milton's Satan is the poetical conception of man de-
veloped from an infant in long-clothes into a boisterous
but dreamy youth, ascribing to every incomprehensible
effect an arbitrary, poetical cause. Goethe's Mephisto-
pheles, lastly, is the truthful conception of evil as it
really exists in a thousand forms, evolved from our own
misunderstood and artificially and dogmatically dis-
torted nature.

Goethe, in destroying the Devil as such, consigned
him to the primeval myths and legends of ignorance and
fear, and has shown us the real nature of the evil.

What then is the Devil ?

The Devil took, as I said in the beginning, his origin
in our blinded senses, in an undue preponderance of
that which is material in us over that which is intellec-
tual. The moment we look the Evil Spirit in the face,
he vanishes as an absolute being and becomes —

A portion of that power
Which wills the bad and works the good at every hour.

After having been exposed during several periods of
generations to new conditions, thus rendering a great
amount of variation possible, the Devil has developed
from a monster into a monkey, and from a monkey into
a man endowed with the nature of a monkey and the

156

MYSTIC LONDON.

propensities of a monster. In the State and in the
Church, in Arts and Sciences, the Devil is the principle
of injustice, hypocrisy, ugliness, and ignorance, Goethe
has annihilated the ideal poetical grandeur of Milton's
Satan ; he has stripped Luther's Devil of his vulgar
realism ; Goethe has driven Satan from an imaginary
hell, where he preferred to rule instead of worshipping
and serving in heaven, and with the sponge of common
sense he wiped the horned monster, drawn by the imag-
ination of dogmatists, from the black board of igno-
rance. In banishing the Evil Spirit into the dominion
of myths, Goethe showed him in his real nature. Dar-
win displaced man from the exalted pedestal of a spe-
cial creation, and endeavored to trace him as the devel-
opment of cosmical elements. Darwin enabled us to
look upon man as the completing link in the great chain
of the gradual evolution of the life-giving forces of the
Universe, and he rendered thus our position more com-
prehensible and natural. Goethe, in proving that the
Evil Spirit of ancient and Hebrew-Christian times was
a mere phantom of an ill-regulated fantasy, taught us to
look for the real origin of evil. What was a metaphys-
ical incomprehensibility became an intelligible reality.
The Demon can be seen in " Faust " as in a mirror, and
in glancing into it we behold our Darwinian progenitor,
the animal, face to face. Before the times of Goethe,
with very few exceptions, the Evil Spirit was an entity
with whom any one might become familiar — in fact, the
" spirUiis fa7niliaris " of old. The Devil spoke, roared,
whispered, could sign contracts. We were able to yield
our soul to him ; and he could bodily enter our body.
The Devil was a corporeal entity. The rack, water, and
fire were used to expel him from sorcerers and witches,

DARWINISM OJV THE DEVIL. 157

and to send him into all sorts of unclean animals.
Goethe, in unmasking this phantom, introduced him not
as something without; but as an element within us. The
service rendered to humanity in showing us the true
nature of evil is as grand as the service rendered by
Mr. Darwin in assigning to man his place ifi nature, and
not above nature. It is curious that those who have
most of the incorrigible and immovable animal nature
in them should protest with the greatest vehemence and
clamor against this theory. They think by asserting
their superiority, based on a special creation, to become
at once special and superior beings, and prefer this po-
sition to trying, through a progressive development in
science and knowledge, in virtue and honesty, to prove
the existence of the higher faculties with which man has
been endowed through his gradual development from
the lowest phases of living creatures to the highest. In
assuming the Devil to be something absolute and posi-
tive, and not something relative and negative, man
hoped to be better able to grapple with him. Mephis-
topheles is nothing personal ; he can, like the Creator
himself, be only traced in his works. The Devil lurks
beneath the venerable broadcloth of an intolerant and
ignorant priest ; he uses the seducing smiles of a wicked
beauty ; he stirs the blood of the covetous and grasp-
ing ; he strides through the gilded halls of ambitious
emperors and ministers, who go with " light hearts " to
kill thousands of human beings with newly-invented
infernal machines ; he works havoc in the brains of the
vain. The Devil shuffles the cards for the gambler,
and destroys our peace whether he makes us win or
lose on the turf; he sits joyfully grinning on the tops of
bottles and tankards filled with alcoholic drinks; he

J ^8 MYSTIC LONDON.

entices us on Sunday to shut our museums and open
our gin-palaces ; to neglect the education of the masses j
and then prompts us to accuse them, with hypocritical
respectability of drunkenness and stupidity. It is the
Devil who turns us into friends of lapdogs and makes
us enemies of the homeless. The Devil is the greatest
master in dogmatism ; he creates sects who, in the name
of love and humility, foster hatred and pride ; the-
Devil encloses men in a magic circle on the barren
heath of useless speculation ; drives them round and
round like blinded horses in a mill, starting from one
point, and after miles and miles of travel and fatigue,
leading us to the point, sadder but not wiser, from
which we set out. The Devil makes us quarrel wheth-
er we ought to have schools with or without bigoted re-
ligious teachings ; he burns incense to stupefy our
senses, lights candles to obscure our sight, amuses the
masses with buffooneries to prevent them from thinking,
draws us away from common-sense morality, and leads
us under the pretext of a mystic and symbolic religion,
to the confessional, the very hothouse of mischief. Sa-
tan in all his shapes and forms as he rules the world
has been described by Goethe as Egotism. Selfishness
is his element and real nature. Selfishness not yet
realizing the divine, because so entirely humane, com-
mand— " Do unto others as you wish that they should
do unto you." Selfishness is the only essence of evil.
Selfishness has divided men into different nations, and
fosters in them pride, envy, jealousy, and hatred. Mr
Darwin has shown that one animal preys on the other,
that the weaker species has to yield to the stronger.
Goethe again has shown us how the Evil Spirit drags
us throudi life's wild scenes and its flat unmeaninainess,

I

m DARWINISM ON THE DEVIL. i^^j

to seek mere sensual pleasures and to neglect altogether
our higher and better nature, which is the outgrowth of
our more complicated, more highly developed organiza-
tion. Were we only to recognize this, our real nature,
we should leave less to chance and prejudices ; were
we to study man from a physiological, psychological,
and honestly historical point of view, we should soon
eliminate selfishness from among us, and be able to
appreciate what is really the essence of evil. The more
nearly we approach Darwin's primitive man, the ape,
the nearer do we draw to the Mephistopheles who shows
us his exact nature with impudent sincerity in Goethe's
"Faust."

That which changes our Psyche, that is our intellec-
tual faculty with its airy wings of imagination, its
yearnings for truth, into an ugly, submissive, crawl-
ing worm, is heartless selfishness. Not without reason
is poor guileless Margaret horrified at Mephistopheles.
She shudders, hides herself on the bosom of Faust, like
a dove under the wing of an eagle, and complains that
the Evil Spirit —

.... Ahvays wears such mocking grin,
Half cold, half grim.

One sees that nought has interest for him ;
'Tis writ on his brow, and can't be mistaken,
No soul in him can love awaken.

When all goes wrong, when religious, social and
, political animosities and hatred disturb the peace ;
when unintelligible controversies on the inherited sin,
the origin of evil, justification and transubstantiation,
" grace and free vvill," the creative and the created,
mystic incantations, real and unreal presences, the like
but not equal, the affirmative and the negative natures

i6o

MYSTIC LONDON-:

of God and man confuse the finite brains of infinite
talkers and repeaters of the same things ; when they
quarrel about the wickedness of the hen who dared
to lay an ^gg on the Sabbath ; when the glaring torch
of warfare is kindled by the lire of petty animosities,
then the Evil Spirit of egotism celebrates its most glori-
ous festivals.

Who can banish this monster, this second and worse
part of our nature ? To look upon it from a Darwinian
point of view. Goethe saves his fallen Faust through
useful occupation, through honest hard work for the
benefit of mankind. The more we make ourselves
acquainted with evil, the last remnant of our animal
nature, in a rational and not mystic dogmatical sense,
the less we exalt ourselves as exceptional creatures above
nature, the easier it must be for us to dry up the source
of superstition and ignorance which serves to nourish
this social monster.

Let our relations to each other be based on " mutual
love," for God is love, and selfishness as the antagonist
of love, and the Devil as the antagonist of God, will
both vanish.

Let us strive to vanquish our unnatural social organi-
zation by a natural, social, but, at the same time, liberal
union of all into one common brotherhood, and the roar-
ing lion will be silenced for ever.

Let us purify society of all its social, or rather un-
social, iniquities and falsehoods, of all ingratitude and
envy, in striving for an honest regeneration of our-
selves, and through ourselves of humanity at large, con-
vincing one another that man has developed by degrees
into earth's fairest creature, destined for good and
happiness, and not for evil and wretchedness, and there
will be an end of the Devil and all his deviltries.

FECULIAK PEOPLE. i6j

CHAPTER XXIV.

PECULIAR PEOPLE.

TN this title, be it distinctly understood, no reference
is intended to those anti-TEscul apian persons who,
from time to time, sacrifice to Moloch among the Essex
marshes. It is not necessary to journey even as far as
Pkunstead in search of peculiarity, since the most mani-
fold and ever varjdng types of it lie at one's very doors.
And here, at the outset, without quite endorsing the
maxim that genius is always eccentric, let it it be con-
fessed that a slight deviation from the beaten track is
generally apt to be interesting. When we see the
photograph of some distinguished artist, musician, or
poet, and find the features very like those of the pork
butcher in the next street_, or the footman over the way,
we are consc-ious of a feeling of disappointment almost
amounting to a personal grievance. Mr. Carlyle and
Algernon Swinburne satisfy us. They look as we feel
graphic writers and erotic poets ought to look. Not so
the literary females who affect the compartment labelled
" For ladies only " in the reading room of the British
Museum or on the Metropolitan Railway. They are
mostly like one's maiden aunts, and savor far less of
the authoress than some of the charming girls who
studiously avoid their exclusive locale^ and evidently use
their reading ticket only to cover with an appearance of
propriety a most unmistakable flirtation. This they
carry on sotto voce with ardent admirers of the male sex,

J 52 MYSTIC LONDON.

who, though regular frequenters of the reading room,
are no more literary than themselves. One might pick
out a good many peculiar people from that learned re-
treat— that poor scholar's club room ; but let us rather
avoid any such byways of life, and select our peculiars
from the broad highway. Hunting there, Diogenes-
wise, with one's modest lantern, in search — not of hon-
est— but eccentric individuals.

And first of all, having duly attended to the ladies
at the outset, let there be " Place for the Clergy.'*
There is my dear friend the Rev. Gray Kidds, the best
fellow breathing, but from a Diogenes point of view,
decidedly eccentric. Gray Kidds is one of those indi-
viduals whose peculiarity it is never to have been a boy.
Kidds at fifteen had whiskers as voluminous as he
now has at six-and twenty, and as he gambolled heavily
amongst his more puerile schoolfellows, visitors to the
playground used to ask the assistant masters who that
man was playing with the boys. They evidently had
an uneasy notion that a private lunatic asylum formed
a branch of the educational establishment, and that
Gray Kidds was a harmless patient allowed to join the
boys in their sports. Gray Kidds was and is literally
harmless. He grew up through school and college,
innocently avoiding all those evils which proved the ruin
of many who were deemed far wiser than himself. He
warbled feebly on the flute, and was adored as a curate,
not only for his tootle-tooings, but for his diligent pres-
ence at mothers' meetings, and conscientious labors
among the poor. A preacher Kidds never pretended
to be ; but he had the singular merit of brevity, and
crowded more harmless heresies into ten minutes' pulpit
oratory than Colenso or Voysey could have done in

PECULIAR PEOPLE. 163

double the time. The young ladies made a dead set at
him, of course, for Kidds was in every respect eligible •
and he let them stroke him like a big pet lamb, but
there matters ended. Kidds never committed himself.
He is now the incumbent of a pretty church in the
suburbs, built for him by his aunt, and, strange to say,
the church fills. Whether it is that his brevity is attrac-
tive, or his transparent goodness compensates for his
other peculiarities, certainly he has a congregation ;
and if you polled that congregation, the one point on
which all would agree, in addition to his eligibility or
innocence, would be that the Rev. Gray Kidds was "so
funny."

And now, for our second type of peculiarity, let us
beat back for one moment to the fair sex again. Mrs.
Ghoul is the reverse of spirituelle ; but she is something
more — she is spiritualistic. She devoutly believes that
the spirits of deceased ancestors come at her bidding,
and tilt the table, move furniture insanely about, or
write idiotic messages automatically. She is perfectly
serious. She does " devoutly " believe this. It
is her creed. It is a comfort to her. It is ex-
tremely difficult to reconcile such a source of comfort
with any respect for one's departed relatives, but that is
Mrs. Ghoul's peculiarity and qualification for a niche
amongst our originals.

Miss Deedy, on the other hand, is ecclesiastical to the
backbone. Miss Deedy ruins her already feeble health
with early mattins (she insists on the double t) and fre-
quent fasts. Be3^ond an innocuous flirtation with the
curate at decorations, or a choral meeting, Miss Deedy
has as few sins as most of us to answer for ; but, from
her frequent penances, she might be a monster of

164

MYSTIC LONDON

iniquity. She is known to confess, and is suspected of
wearing sackcloth. Balls and theatres she eschews as
" worldly," and yet she is only just out of her teens.
She would like to be a nun, she says, if the habits were
prettier, and they allowed long curls down the back, and
Gainsboroughs above the brow. As it is. Miss Deedy
occupies a somewhat abnormal position, dangling, like
Mahomet's coffin, between the Church and the world.
That, again, is Miss Deedy's peculiarity.

Miss Wiggles is a " sensitive." That is a new voca-
tion struck out by the prolific ingenuity of the female
mind. Commonplace doctors would simply call her
" hysterical ; " but she calls herself magnetic. She is
stout and inclined to a large appetite, particularly affect-
ing roast pork with plenty of seasoning ; but she passes
readily into " the superior condition " under the manip-
ulations of a male operator. She makes nothing, save
notoriety, by her clairvoyance and other peculiarities ;
but she z> very peculiar, though the type of a larger class
than is perhaps imagined in this highly sensational age
of ours.

Peculiar boys, too — ^what lots of them there are ! What
is called affectation in a girl prevails to quite as large an
extent in the shape of endless peculiarities among boys.
A certain Dick (his name is Adolphus, but he is uni-
versally, and for no assignable reason, known as Dick)
rejoices in endorsing Darwinism by looking and acting
like a human gorilla. Dick is no fool, but assumes that
virtue though he has it not. To see him mumbling his
food at meals, or making mops and mows at the wall,
you would think him qualified for Earlswood ; but if it
comes to polishing off a lesson briskly, or being mulct of
his pudding or pocket-money. Master Dick accomplishes

INTER VIE WING AN AS TROLOGER. 1 65

the polishing process with a rapidity that gives the He to
his Darwinian assumption.

Well, they are a source of infinite fun, these eccentrics
— the comets of our social system. They have, no
doubt, an object in their eccentricity, a method in theii
madness, which we prosaic planetary folks cannot
fathom. At all events, they amuse us and don't harm
themselves. They are uniformly happy and contented
with themselves. Of them assuredly is true, and with-
out the limitation he appends, Horace's affirmation,
Duke est desipere, which Mr. Theodore Martin trans-
lates, " 'Tis pleasing at times to be slightly insane."

CHAPTER XXV.

INTERVIEWING AN ASTROLOGER.

T7OR several years — in fact ever since my first ac
quaintance with these " occult " matters whereinto 1
am now such a veteran investigator — my great wish has
been to become practically acquainted with some Pro-
fessor of Astral Science. One friend, indeed, I had who
had devoted a long lifetime to this and kindred subjects,
and of whom I have to speak anon ; but he had never
utilized his knowledge so as to become the guide,
philosopher, and friend of amorous housemaids on the
subject of their matrimonial alliances, or set himself to
discover petty larcenies for a fee of half-a-crown. He
assured me, however, that the practice of astrology was
as rife as ever in London at this moment, and that
businesses in that line were bought and sold for sterling

1 66 MYSTIC LONDON.

coin of the realm, just as though they had been " cor-
ner " pubHcs, or " snug concerns " in the cheesemon-
gery line. All this whetted my appetite for inquiry,
and seeing one Professor Wilson advertise persistently
in the Medium to the effect that " the celebrated Astrol-
oger may be consulted on the events of life " from two
to nine p.m., I wrote to Professor Wilson asking for an
interview ; but the celebrated astrologer did not favor me
with a reply.

Foiled in my first attempt I waited patiently for about
a year, and then broke ground again — I will not say
whether with Professor Wilson, or some other prac-
titioner of astral science. I will call my Archimago
Professor Smith, of Newington Causeway, principally
for the reason that this is neither the real name nor the
correct address. I have no wish to advertise any
wizard gratuitously ; nor would it be fair to him, since,
as will be seen from the sequel, his reception of me was
such as to make it probable that he would have an in-
convenient number of applicants on the conditions ob-
served at my visit.

Availing myself, then, of the services of my friend
above mentioned, I arranged that we should together
pay a visit to Professor Smith, of Newington Causeway,
quite "permiscuous," as Mrs. Gamp would say. My
companion would go with his own horoscope already
constructed, as he happened to know the exact hour
and minute of his birth — ^particulars as to which I only
possessed the vaguest information, which is all I fancy
most of us have ; though there was one circumstance
connected with my own natal day which went a long
way towards " fixing " it.

It was on a Monday evening that I visited this modern

INTERVIEWING AN ASTROLOGER. 167

Delphic oracle ; and, strangely enough, as is often the
case, other events seemed to lead up to this one. The
very lesson on Sunday evening was full of astrology.
It v/as, I may mention, the story of the handwriting on
the wall and the triumph of Daniel over the magicians.
Then I took up my Chaucer on Monday morning ; and
instead of the " Canterbury Tales," opened it at the
" Treatise on the Astrolabe," which I had never read
before, but devoured them as greedily as no doubt did
"Little Lowis," to whom it is addressed. All this tended
to put me in a proper frame of mind for my visit to
Newington ; so, after an early tea, we took my friend's
figure of his nativity with us, and went.

Professor Smith, we found, lived in a cosy house in
the main road, the parlors whereof he devoted to the
purposes of a medical magnetist, which was his calling,
as inscribed upon the wire blinds of the ground floor
front. We were ushered at once into the professor's
presence by a woman who, I presume, was his wife — a
quiet respectable body with nothing uncanny about her.
The front parlor was comfortably furnished and scru-
pulously clean, and the celebrated Professor himself, a
pleasant, elderly gentleman, was sitting over a manu-
script which he read by the light of a Queen's reading
lamp. There was not, on the one hand, any charlatan
assumption in his get-up, nor, on the other, was there
that squalor and neglect of the decencies of life which I
have heard sometimes attaches to the practitioners in
occult science. Clad in a light over-coat, with specta-
cles on nose, and bending over his MS., Professor
Smith might have been a dissenting parson en deshabille
*' getting off " his Sunday discourse, or a village school-
master correcting the " themes " of his pupils. He was

1 68 MYSTIC LONDON..

neither ; he was a nineteenth century astrologer, calcu-
lating the probabilities of success for a commercial
scheme, the draft prospectus of which was the document
over which he pored. As he rose to receive us, I was
almost disappointed to find that he held no v/and, wore
no robe, and had no volume of mystic lore by his side.
The very cat that emerged from underneath his table,
and rubbed itself against my legs, was not of the ortho-
dox sable hue, but simple tabby and white.

My friend opened the proceedings by producing the
figure of his nativity, and saying he had come to ask a
question in horary astrology relative to a certain scheme
about which he was anxious, such anxiety constituting
what he termed a " birth of the mind." Of course this
was Dutch to me, and I watched to see whether the
Professor would be taken off his guard by finding he
was in presence of one thoroughly posted up in astral
science. Not in the least ; he greeted him as a brother
chip, and straightway the two fell to discussing the
figure. The Professor worked a new one, which he
found to differ in some slight particulars from the one
my friend had brought. Each, however, had worked it
by logarithms, and there was much talk of " trines "
and " squares " and " houses," which I could not under-
stand ; but eventually the coveted advice was given by
the Professor and accepted by my friend as devoutly as
though it had been a response of the Delphic oracle
itself. The business would succeed, but not without
trouble, and possibly litigation on my friend's part. He
was to make a call on a certain day and "push the mat-
ter " a month afterwards ; all of which he booked in a
business-like manner. This took a long time, for the
Professor was perpetually making pencil signs on the

INTERVIEWING AN ASTROLOGER. i6g

figure he had constructed, and the two also discussed
Zadkiel, Raphael, and other astronomers they had
mutually known. Continual reference had to be made
to the "Nautical Almanack ;" but by-and-by my friend's
innings was over and mine commenced. I have said
that I did not know the exact hour and minute of my
birth, and when, with appropriate hesitation, I named
the I St of April as the eventful day, the Professor looked
at me for a moment with a roguish twinkle of the eye
as though to ascertain that I was not poking fun at him.
I assured him, however, that such was the inauspicious
era of my nativity, and moreover that I was born so
closely on the confines of March 31 — I do not feel it
necessary to specify the year — as to make it almost du-
bious whether I could claim the honors of April-Fool-
dom. This seemed enough for him — though he warned
me that the absence of the exact time might lead to
some vagueness in his communications — and he pro-
ceeded forthwith to erect my figure \ which, by the way,
looked to me very much like making a "figure" in
Euclid ; and I peered anxiously to see whether mine
bore any resemblance to the Pons Asinorum !

I feared I had led my philosopher astray altogether
when the first item of information he gave me was that,
at about the age of twenty-one. I had met with some
accident to my arm, a circumstance which I could not
recall to memory. Several years later I broke my leg,
but I did not tell him that. Going further back, he
informed me that about the age of fourteen, if I hap-
pened to be apprenticed, or in any way placed under
authority, I kicked violently over the traces ; which was
quite true, inasmuch as I ran away from school twice at
that precise age, so that w\\ astrologer scored one. K\

I'JQ

MYSTIC LONDON.

twenty-eight I married (true), and at thirty-two things
were particularly prosperous with me— a fact which I
was also constrained to acknowledge correct. Then
came a dreadful mistake. If ever I had anything to do
with building or minerals, I should be very successful.
I never had to do with building save once in my life,
and then Mr. Briggs's loose tile v/as nothing to the diffi-
culties in which I became involved. Minerals I had
never dabbled in beyond the necessary consumption of
coals for domestic purposes. I had an uncle who inter-
ested himself in my welfare some years ago- — this was
correct-^-and something was going to happen to my
father's sister at Midsummer, 1876. This, of course, I
cannot check ; but I trust, for the sake of my venerable
relation, it may be nothing prejudicial.* I was also to
suffer from a slight cold about the period of my birth-
day in that same year, and was especially to beware
of damp feet. My eldest brother, if I had one, he said,
had probably died, which was again correct ; and if my
wife caught cold she suffered in her throat, which piece
of information, if not very startling, I am also con-
strained to confess is quite true. Then followed a most
delicate piece of information, which I blush as I commit
to paper. I wished to marry when I was twenty-one,
but circumstances prevented. Then it was that the
memories of a certain golden-haired first love came
back through the vista of memory. I was then a Fel-
low of my College, impecunious except as regarded my
academical stipend, so the young lady took advice, and
paired off with a well-to-do cousin. Sic transit gloria
mundi I We are each of us stout, unromantic family
people now ; but the reminiscence made me feel quite
romantic for the moment in that jrround floor in New-

INTER I 'IE IVIA'G AN AS TROLOGER. j 7 1

ington Causeway ; and I was inclined to say, " A Daniel
come to judgment I " but I checked myself,aDd remarked,
sotto voce^ in the vernacular, " Right again, Mr. Smith! "

Before passing on to analyze me personally, he re-
marked that my wife's sister and myself were not on
the best of terms. I owned that words had passed
between us ; and then he told me that in my cerebral
development there was a satisfactory fusion of caution
and combativeness. I was not easily knocked over, or,
if so, had energy to get up again. This energy was to
tell in the future. This, I believe, is a very useful
feature of horoscopic revelation. Next year was to be
particularly prosperous. I should travel a good deal — ■
had travelled somewhat this year, and was just now
going to take a short journey ; but I should travel a
great deal more next year. I own to asking myself
whether this could bear any reference to the Pontigny
Pilgrimage in which I shared this year, and the possible
pilgrimage to Rome next summer, and also a projected
journey to Scotland by the Limited Mail next Tuesday
evening! On the whole, my astrologer had scored a
good many points.

The most marvellous revelation of all yet remains to
be made, however. When we rose to go we each of us
endeavored to force a fee on Professor Smith, but noth-
ing would induce liim to receive a farthing ! I had got
all my revelations, my " golden " memories of the past,
my bright promises of the future free, gratis, for noth-
ing ! It will be evident, then, why I do not give this
good wizard's address, lest I inundate him with gratuit-
ous applicants, and why I therefore veil his personality
under the misleading title of Professor Smith, of New
ington Causeway.

172

MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER XXVI.

A BARMAID SHOW.

nPHE present age, denounced by some ungenial cen-
sors as the age of shams, may be described by
more kindly critics as emphatically an age of " shows."
Advancing from the time-honored shows of Flora and
Pomona — if not always improving on the type — and so
on from the cattle show, suggestive of impending Christ-
mas fare, we have had horse shows, dog shows, and
bird shows. To these the genius of Barnum added baby
shows ; and, if we are not misinformed, a foreign firm,
whose names have become household words amongst
us, originated, though not exactly in its present form,
the last kind of show which has been acclimatized in
England — an exhibition of barmaids. We had two
baby shows in one year — one at Highbury Barn, by Mr.
Giovannelli ; the other at North Woolwich Gardens, by
Mr. Holland ; and it is to the talent of this latter gentle-
man, in the way of adaptation, that we owe the exhi-
bition of young ladies "practising at the bar." From
babies to barmaids is indeed a leap, reversing the ordi-
nary process of going from the sublime to the ridicu-
lous ; for while to all but appreciative mammas those
infantile specimens of humanity savor largely of the ri-
diculous, there can be no question that the present
generation of dames de coniptoir is a very sublime article
indeed. I do not say this in derision, nor am I among
those who decry the improvements introduced during

A BARMAID SHOW. ly^

the last few years, both into refreshment bars them-
selves, and, notably, into the class of ladies who preside
over them. The discriminating visitor will probably
prefer to receive his sandwich and glass of bitter at the
hands of S. pretty barmaid rather than from an oleagin-
ous potman in his shirt sleeves ; and the sherry-cobbler
acquires a racier flavor from the arch looks of the Hebe
who dispenses it. If silly young men do dawdle at the
bar for the sake of the sirens inside, and occasionally,
as we have known to be the case, take unto themselves
these same sirens " for better or for worse," we can only
cite the opinion of well-informed authorities, that very
possibly the young gentlemen in question might have
gone farther and fared worse, and that it is not always
the young lady who has, in such a case, the best of the
bargain.

" So, then, the " Grand Barmaid Contest " opened ;
and in spite of the very unmistakable appearance put
in by Jupiter Fluvius, a numerous assemblage gathered
in the North Woolwich Gardens to inaugurate a festi-
val which, whatever else we may think of it, is at all
events sui generis. Prizes to the value of ;^3oo were to
be presented to the successful candidates, varying from
a purse of twenty sovereigns and a gold watch and
chain, down to " a purse of two sovereigns," with
" various other prizes, consisting of jewelry, &c."

Among the conditions, it was required that every
young lady should be over sixteen years of age ; that
she should be dressed in plaift but good articles of at-
tire, " in which a happy blending of colors without
prominent display is most suitable ;" and it was more-
over stipulated that each " young lady " should " ingra-
tiate herself with the public in the most affable man-

174 MYSTIC LONDON..

ner at her command, without undue forwardness, oi
frivoHty, but still retaining a strict attention to busi-
ness." No young lady was permitted to take part in
the contest unless she had been in the refreshment
business for twelve months, and could produce good
testimonials of character.

Upwards of seven hundred applications were made,
out of which Mr. Holland selected fifty. Whence the
large number of rejections " deponent sayeth not." Of
these twenty- eight actually put in an appearance at
three p. m. on the opening day, and four were expected
to join in a day or two. Every visitor is provided with
a voting ticket, which he hands to the lady of his ad-
miration, and which counts towards the prize. Each
young lady also receives five per cent, on what she sells
at her bar. The places are awarded by lot, and, by a
freak of fortune, the two most attractive demoiselles
happened to come together. These were Numbers One
and Fourteen. The former young lady — who desires
to be known by her number only — true genius being
ever modest — was certain to stand Number One in
popular esteem ; and, if chignons are taken into ac-
count, she ought literally to " head " the list by a very
long way. The room was tastefully decorated by
Messrs. JJefries, and an excellent band enlivened the
proceedings. As evening drew on the meeting grew
more hilarious, but there was not the slightest impro-
priety of any kind, the faintest approach thereto lead-
ing to immediate expulsion.

Many persons may be disposed to ask, in respect of
such exhibitions, Qui Bono ? But, at all events, there
was nothing which the veriest Cato could denounce as
demoralizing. The "young ladies " were all most mod-

A BARMAID SHOW.

175

estly attired in " sober livery j" and certainly, though
comparisons are odious, not so pressing in their atten-
tions, as we have seen some other young ladies at
Dramatic Fetes, or even some devouees at charitable
bazaars. If we judge from the large numbers that vis-
ited North Woolwich, " in spite of wind or weather,"
Mr. Holland was likely to reap an abundant harvest
from this latest "idea"' excogitated from his fertile
brain. As the babies have had their " show," and the
stronger sex is not likely to be equal to the task of being
exhibited just yet, there seems only one section of so-
ciety open to the speculations of a skilful entrepreneur.
Why does not some one, in a more serious line than
Mr. Holland, try what Sydney Smith calls the " third
sex," and open an exhibition of curates, with a genuine
competition for prizes r There could be no possible
doubt as to the success of such a display, and the in-
struction to be derived from it would be equally beyond
question. In the meantime we have advanced one
step towards such a consummation. The adult human
being has taken the place of the baby, and people evi-
dently like it.- Where will the rage for exhibitions stop ?
Who can feay to the advancing tide of shows, " Thus
far shalt thou go. and no farther ? " Other classes of
society will probably have their turn, and may think
themselves fortunate if they show up as well as Mr.
Holland's " young ladies."

176 MYSTIC LONDON,

CHAPTER XXVII.

A PRIVATE EXECUTION.

T WAS quietly fiddling away one evening in the Civil
Service band at King's College, as was my custom
while my leisure was larger than at present, when the
gorgeous porter of the college entered with a huge bil-
let, which he placed on my music-stand with a face of
awe. It was addressed to me, and in the corner of it
was written "Order for Execution." The official
waited to see how I bore it, and seemed rather sur-
prised that I went on with my fiddling, and smilingly
said, " All right." I knew it was an order from the
authorities of Horsemonger Lane Jail, admitting me to
the private execution of Margaret Waters, the notorious
baby-farmer.

If anything is calculated to promote the views of
those who advocate the abolition of capital punishment,
it is the fact of a woman meeting her death at the
hands of the common hangman. There is something
abhorrent, especially to the mind of the stronger sex, in
the idea of a female suffering the extreme penalty of
the law. On the other hand, the crime for which Mar-
garet Waters suffered — which is too much a cause
dlebre to need recapitulation — is exactly the one that
would exile her from ■ the sympathy of her own sex.
Whilst therefore her case left the broad question much
in the same position as before, we are not surprised to
find that strenuous efforts had been made to obtain a

A PRIVATE EXECUTION. 177

comiTiulation of the sentence. Mr. Gilpin, Mr. Samuel
Morley and Mr. Baines had been conspicuous for their
efforts in the cause of mercy. All, however, had been
to no purpose. Margaret Waters was privately exe-
cuted within the walls of Horsemonger Lane Jail at
nine o'clock.

It was a thankless errand that called one from one's
bed whilst the moon was still struggling with the feeble
dawn of an October morning, and through streets al-
ready white with the incipient frost of approaching
winter, to see a fellow-creature — and that a wom'an — •
thus hurried out of existence. On arriving at the
gloomy prison-house I saw a fringe of roughs loung-
ing about, anxious to catch a glimpse, if only of the
black flag that should apprise them of the tragedy they
were no longer privileged to witness. Even these, how-
ever, did not muster in strong force until the hour of
execution drew near. On knocking at the outer wicket
the orders of admission were severely scrutinized, and
none allowed to pass except those borne by the repre-
sentatives of the press, or persons in some way official-
ly connected with the impending " event." There was
an air of grim "business" about all present, which
showed plainly that none were there from choice, nor
any who would not feel relief when the fearful spectacle
was over. After assembling, first of all, in the porter's
lodge, we were conducted by the governor, Mr. Keene,
to the back of the prison, through courtyards and
kitchen gardens ; and in the corner of one of the
former we came upon the ghastly instrument of death
itself. Here half-a dozen warders only were scattered
about, and Mr. Calcraft was arranging his paraphernalia
with the air of a connoisseur. I remember — so strange-

178 MYSTIC LONDON. j

ly does one's mind take in unimportant details at .such
a crisis — being greatly struck with the fine leeks which
were growing in that particular corner of the prison
garden where the grim apparatus stood, and we — some
five-and-twenty at most, and all in the way of " busi-
ness " — stood, too, waiting for the event !

Then ensued a quarter of an hour's pause, in that
cold morning air, when suddenly boomed out the prison
bell, that told us the last few minutes of the convict's
life had come. The pinioning took place within the
building \ and on the stroke of nine, the gloomy proces-
sion emerged, the prisoner walked between the chaplain
and Calcraft, with a firm step, and even mounting the
steep stair to the gallows without needing assistance.
She was attired in a plaid dress with silk mantle, her
head bare, and hair neatly arranged.

As this was my first experience in private hanging, I
do not mind confessing that I misdoubted my powers of
endurance. I put a small brandy-flask in my pocket,
and stood close by a corner around which I could retire
if the sight nauseated me ; but such is the strange
fascination attaching to exhibitions even of this horrible
kind, that I pushed forward with the rest, and when the
governor beckoned me on to a "good place," I found
myself standing in the front rank with the rest of my
confrlres^ and could not help picturing what that row of
upturned, unsympathizing, pitiless faces must have
looked like to the culprit as contrasted with the more
sympathetic crowds that used to be present at a public
execution.

One of the daily papers in chronicling this event went
so far as to point a moral on the brutalizing effect of
such exhibitions from my momentary hesitation and

A PRIVATE EXECUTION.

179

subsequent struggle forward into the front rank. The
convict's perfect sang froid had a good deal to do with
my own calmness, I expect.

When the executioner had placed the rope round her
neck, and the cap on her head ready to be drawn over
the face, she uttered a long and fervent prayer, ex-
pressed with great volubility and propriety of diction,
every word of which could be distinctly heard by us as
we circled the scaffold. She could not have rounded
her periods more gracefully or articulated them more
perfectly, if she had rehearsed her part beforehand !
Though most of the spectators were more or less inured
to scenes of horror, several were visibly affected, one
kneeling on the bare ground, and another leaning, over-
come with emotion, against the prison wall. At last
she said to the chaplain, " Mr. Jessopp, do you think I
am saved ? " A whispered reply from the clergyman
conveyed his answer to that momentous question. All
left the scaffold except the convict. The bolt was with-
drawn, and, almost without a struggle, Margaret Waters
ceased to exist. Nothing could exceed the calmness
and propriety. of her demeanor, and this, the chaplain
informed us, had been the case throughout since her
condemnation. She had been visited on one occasion
by a Baptist minister, to whose persuasion she belonged ;
but he had, at her own request, forborne to repeat his
visit.^ The prisoner said he was evidently unused to
case§ like hers, and his ministrations rather distracted
than comiiorted her. The chaplain of the Jail had been
unremitting in his attentions, and seemingly with happy
effect. Though she constantly persisted in saying she
was not a murderess in intent, she was yet brought to
see her past conduct in its true light ; and on the pre-

I So MYSTIC LONDOX.

vious Saturday received the Holy Communion in her
cell with one of her brothers. Two of them visited her,
and expressed the strongest feelings of attachment. In
fact, the unhappy woman- seemed to have been deeply
attached to and beloved by all the members of her
family. She had, since her condemnation, eaten scarce-
ly anything, having been kept alive principally by stim-
ulants. Although this, of course, induced great bodily
weakness, she did not from the first exhibit any physical
fear of death. On the night before her execution — that
peaceful moonlight night — when so many thoughts must
have turned to this unhappy woman, she slept little, and
rose early. The chaplain had arranged to be with her
at eight, but she sent for him an hour earlier, and he
continued with her until the end. On Monday night
she penned a long statement addressed to Mr. Jessopp.
This was written with a firm hand on four sides of a
foolscap sheet, expressed with great perspicuity, and
signed with the convict's name. Whilst still repudiat-
ing the idea of being a murderess in intent, she pleaded
guilty to great deceit, and to having obtained money
under false pretenses. If she had not given proper
food, that, she contended, was an error of judgment.
It was hard, she thought, that she should be held ac-
countable for the child who died in the workhouse. She
dwelt much upon the difficulties brought upon her by
her dread of the money-lenders — that fungus growth of
our so-called civilization, who has brought so iMny
criminals to the gallows, besides ruining families every
day in each year of grace ! That she had administered
laudanum she denied. The evidence as to the dirty
condition of the children she asserted to be false. She
wished to avoid all bitterness : but those who had so

A PRIVATE EXECUTION. i8i

deposed had sworn falsely. " I feel sure their con-
sciences will condemn them to-night," she wrote, "for
having caused the death of a fellow-creature." In the
face of the evidence, she felt the jury could not find any
other verdict, or the judge pass any other sentence than
had been done. The case had been got up, she argued,
to expose a system which was wrong. Parents wished
to get rid of their ill-gotten offspring. Their one thought
was to hide their own shame. " They," she concluded,
" are the real sinners. If it were not for their sin, we
should not be sought after."

There must surely be some whose consciente these
words will prick. However this woman deserved the
bitter penalty she has now paid, there is indeed a
tremendous truth in her assertion that she, and such as
she, are but the supply which answers their demand.

And so we filed away as the autumnal sun shone
down upon that gloomy spectacle, leaving her to the
"crowner's 'quest," and the dishonored grave in the
prison precincts. Up to the previous night strong hopes
of a commutation of the sentence were entertained.
Her brothers had memoralized the Home Secretary,
and were only on the previous day informed that the
law must take its course. Let us hope that this stern
example will put a stop, not only to "baby-farming,"
which, as the dead woman truly said, is but a conse-
quence of previous crime — but also to those "pleasant
vices " which are its antecedents and encouragements.

1 82 MYSTIC LONDON,

CHAPTER XXVin.

BREAKING UP FOR THE HOLIDAYS.

T TNROMANTIC as it sounds to say it, I know of

few things more disgusting than to revisit one's
old school after some twenty or thirty years. Let that
dubious decade still remain as to the number of years
.that have elapsed since I left school. In fact it matters
to nobody when I left it \ I revisited it lately. I went
to see the boys break up, as I once broke up, and I felt
disgusted — not with the school, or the breaking up, but
with myself. I felt disgracefully old. In fact, I went
home, and began a poem with these words : —

My years, I f-eel, are getting on :

Yet, ere the trembling balance kicks, I

Will imitate the dying swan,
And sing an ode threnodic — ^vixi.

I never got any farther than that. By the way, I shall
have to mention eventually that the school was King's
College, in the Strand. I am not going to unbosom
beyond this, or to add anything in the way of an auto-
biography ; but the locale would have to come out anon,
and there is no possible reason for concealment.

Well, I went to see them break up for the holidays,
and only got over my antediluvian feelings by seeing
one of the masters still on the staff ^'ho was there when
I was a boy. It was a comfort to think what a Methu-
selah he must be ; and yet, if he will excuse the person-
ality, he looked as rosy and smooth-faced as when he

BREAKING UP FOR THE HOLIDAYS. 183

used to stand me outside his door with my coat-sleeves
turned inside out. It was a way he had. Well, the
presence of that peculiar master made me feel an Adonis
forthwith.

I will not go into the prizes. There were lots of them,
and they were very nice, and the boys looked very happy,
and their mammas legitimately proud. What I want to
speak of is the school speeches or recitations, as they
are termed. King's College School speeches are, to my
thinking, a model of what such things ought to be.

Some schools — I name no names — ^go in for mere
scholastic recitations which nobody understands, and
the boys hate. Others burst out in full-blown theatri-
cals. King's College acts on the motto, Medio tiitissi-
viiis ibis. It keeps the old scholastic recitations, but
gilds the pill by adding the accessory of costume. I
can quote Latin as well as Dr. Pangloss, and certain
lines were running in my mind all the time I was in
King's College Hall. They were

Pueris olim dant crustula bland

Doctores, elementa velint ut discere prima.

First we had a bit of German in the shape of an extract
from Kotzebue's " Die Schlaue Wittwe^^'' or " Tempera-
ments." I wish I had my programme, I would compli-
ment by name the lad who played the charming young
Frau. Suffice it to say the whole thing went off spark-
Ting like a firework. It was short, and made you wish
for more — a great virtue in speeches and sermons. The
dancing-master was perfect. Then came a bit of Col-
man's " Heir at Law." Dr. Pangloss — again I regret
the absence of the programme — was a creation, and —
notwithstanding the proximity of King's College to the

1 8 4 ^'^^^ TIC L OND ON.

Strand I'heatre — the youth wisely abstained from copy-
ing even so excellent a model as Mr. Clarke. Of course,
the bits of Latinity came out with a genuine scholastic
ring. Then a bit of a Greek play, at which — mij-abile
dictu I — everybody laughed, and with w4iich everybody
was pleased. And why ? Because the adjuncts of
costume and properties added to the correct enuncia-
tion of the text, prevented even those, who know little
Latin and less Greek, from being one moment in the
dark as to what was going on. The passage was one
from the " Birds " of Aristophanes ; and the fact of a
treaty being concluded between the Olympians and ter-
restrials, led to the introduction of some interpolatious
as to the Washington Treaty, which, when, interpreted
by the production of the American flag and English
Union Jack, brought down thunders of applause. The
final chorus was sung to " Yankee Doodle," and accom-
panied by a fiddle. The acting and accessories were
perfect ; and what poor Robson used to term the
" horgan " of Triballos, was wonderful. That youth
would be a nice young man for a small tea party. It is
to be hoped that, like Bottom the weaver, he can modulate
his voice, and roar as gently as any sucking-dove.

Most wonderful, however, of all the marvels — that
met me at my old school — was a scene from the
" Critic," played by the most Lilliputian boys. Puff —
played by Powell (I don't forget that name) — ^was simply
marvellous. And yet Powell, if he will forgive me for
saying so, was the merest whipper-snapper. Sir Chris-
topher Hatton could scarcely have emerged from the
nursery ; and yet the idea of utter stolidity never found
a better exponent than that same homoeopathic boy.

Last of all came the conventional scene from Moliere'a

PSYCHOLOGICAL LADIES, 1S5

** L'Avarer Mattre Jacques was good ; Harpagon more
than good. I came away well satisfied, only regretting
I had not brought my eldest boy to see it. My eldest
boy? Egad, and I was just such as he is now, when I
used to creep like a snail unwillingly to those scholas-
tic shades. The spirit of Pangloss came upon me again
as I thought of all I had seen that da}^, — there was
nothing like it in my day. King's College keeps pace
with the times. '''' Tevipora mutantur T'' I mentally
exclaimed j and added, not without a pleasant skepti-
cism, as I gazed once more on the pippin-faced master,
" I wonder whether — nos miitamtir in illis ? "

CHAPTER XXIX.

PSYCHOLOGICAL LADIES.

'T^HERE is no doubt that the "Woman's Rights"
question is going ahead with gigantic strides, not
only in social and political, but also in intellectual
matters. Boys and girls — or rather we ought to say
young ladies and young gentlemen — are grouped to-
gether on the class list of the Oxford Local Examina-
tion, irrespective of sex. A glance at the daily papers
will show us that women are being lectured to on all
subjects down from physical sciences, through English
literature and art, to the construction of the clavecin.
We had fancied, however, that what are technically
termed the " Humanities," or, in University diction,
"Science" — meaning thereby ethics and logic — were

i86 MYSTIC LONDON.

still our own. Now, we are undeceived. We are re-
minded that woman can say, without a solecism, ^^ Homo
sum,'' and may therefore claim to embrace even the
humanities among her subjects of study. Henceforth
the realm of woman is not merely what may be called
" pianofortecultural," as was on.ce the case. It has soar-
ed even above art, literature, and science itself into what
might at first sight appear the uncongenial spheres of
dialectics and metaphysics.

Professor G. Croom Robertson recently commenced
a course of thirty lectures to ladies on Psychology and
Logic, at the Hall, 15, Lower Seymour Street, Portman
Square. Urged, it may be, rather by a desire to see
whether ladies would be attracted by such a subject,
and, if so, what psychological ladies were like, than by
any direct interest in the matters themselves, I applied
to the Hon. Secretary, inquiring whether the inferior sex
were admissible ; and was answered by a ticket admit-
ting one's single male self and a party of ladies a dis-
cretion. The very entrance to the hall — nay, the popu-
lous street itself — removed my doubts as to whether
ladies would be attracted by the subjects ; and on en-
tering I discovered that the audience consisted of sev-
eral hundred ladies, and two unfortunate — or shall it
not rather be said privileged i* — members of the male
sex. The ladies were of all ages, evidently matrons as
well as spinsters, with really nothing at all approaching
a " blue stocking" element; but all evidently bent on
business. All were taking vigorous notes, and seemed
to follow the Professor's somewhat difficult Scotch dic-
tion at least as well as our two selves, who appeared to
represent not only the male sex in general, but the Lon-
don press in particular.

PSYCHOLOGICAL LADIES. 187

Professor Robertson commenced by a brief and well-
timed reference to the accomplished Hypatia, familiar
to ladies from Kingsley's novel — in the days when ladies
used to read novels — and also the Royal ladies whom
Descartes and Leibnitz found apter disciples than the
savants. It was, however, he remarked, an imperti-
nence to suppose that any apology was needed for in-
troducing such subjects btfore ladies. He plunged
therefore at once in medias res^ and made his first lec-
ture not a mere isolated or introductory one, but the
actual commencement of his series. Unreasoned facts,
he said, formed but a mere fraction of our knowledge —
even the simplest process resolving themselves into a
chain of inference. Truth is the result of logical rea-
soning; and not only truth, but Xxw'Cufor all. The sci-
ences deal with special aspects of truth. These sciences
may be arranged in the order — i. Mathematics ; 2,
Physics ; 3. Chemistry ; 4. Biology — each gradually
narrowing its sphere ; the one enclosed, so to say, in the
other, and each presupposing those above it. Logic
was presupposed by all. Each might be expressed by a
word endingjn " logy," therefore logic might be termed the
" science of sciences." The sciences were special ap-
plications of logic. Scientific men speak lightly of logic,
and say truth can be discovered without it. This is
true, but trivial. We may as well object to physiology
because we can digest without a knowledge of it ; or to
arithmetic, because it is possible to reckon without it.
Scientific progress has been great ; but its course might
have been strewn with fewer wrecks had its professors
been more generally logicians. But then logic presup-
poses something else. We have to investigate the ori-
gin and growth of knowledge — the laws under which

l88 MYSTIC LONDON.

knowledge comes to be. Under one aspect this science
— psychology — should be placed highest up in the scale \
but under another it would rank later in point of devel-
opment than even biology -itself, because it is not every
being that thinks. This twofold aspect is accounted
for by the peculiarity of its subject-matter — viz., mind.

The sciences are comparatively modern. Mathemat-
ics but some 3000 or 4000 years old ; physics, three
centuries ; chemistry, a thing of the last, biology only
of the present century. But men philosophized before
the sciences. The ancient Greeks had but one science
— mathematics. Now men know a little of many sci-
ences ; but what we want is men to connect — to knit to-
gether— the sciences ; to have their knowledge all of a
piece. The knowledge of the ancient Greek directed
his actions, and entered far more into his daily life than
ours does. This, he observed, was philosophy. This is
what we want now ; and this is what is to be got from
psycholog}^ There is not a single thing between heaven
and earth that does not admit of a mental expression ;
or, in other words, possess a subjective aspect, and
therefore come under psychology.

This, in briefest outline, is a sketch of the " strong
meat " offered to the psychological ladies. A single
branch of psychology — that, namely, of the intellect,
excluding that of feeling and action — ^is to occupy ten
lectures, the above being number one. The other twenty
will be devoted to logic.

The next lecture was devoted to an examination of
the brain and nervous system, and their office in men-
tal processes. Alas, however, how different was now
the audience ! Only some thirty ladies — scarcely more
than one-tenth of those who were present at the open-

SECULARi:SM OA' BUA-VAA'. 1 89

ing lecture — have permanently entered for the course.
It is no disrespect to the ladies to hazard the conjecture
whether the subject be not a little out of range for the
present. We are moving ahead rapidly, and many fool-
ish ideas as to the intellectual differences of the sexes
are becoming obsolete. We have literary and artistic
ladies by thousands. Scientific ladies, in the ordinary
acceptation of the term, are coming well to the front.
Possibly we may have to "wait a little longer" before
we get, on anything like a large scale, psychological or
even logical ladies.

CHAPTER XXX.

SECULARISM ON BUNYAN.

TT is very marvellous to observe the number of
strange and unexpected combinations that are con-
tinually occurring in that moral kaleidoscope we call
societ}^ I do not suppose that I am exceptional in
coming across these ; nor do I use any particular in-
dustry in seeking them out. They come to me ; all I
do is to keep my eyes open, and note the impressions
they make on me. I was humbly pursuing my way one
Tuesday evening towards the abode of a phrenologist
with the honest intention of discovering my cranio-
logical condition, when, in passing down Castle Street,
Oxford Market, I was made aware that Mr. G. J.
Holyoake was there and then to deliver himself on the
'' Literary Genius of Bunyan." This was one of the

, ^o MYSTIC L ONDON,

incongruous combinations I spoke of ; and forthwith I
passed into the Co-operative Hall, resolving to ' defer
my visit to the phrenologist. There are some facts of
which it is better to remain contentedly ignorant > and
I have no doubt my own mental condition belongs to
that category.

I found the Co-operative Hall a handsome and com-
modious building ; and a very fair audience had gather-
ed to listen to Mr. Holyoake, who is an elderly thin-
voiced man, and his delivery was much impeded on the
occasion in question by the circumstance of his having a
bad cold and cough. After a brief extempore allusion
to the fact of the Duke of Bedford having erected a
statue to Eunyan, which he regarded as a sort of com-
pensation for his Grace ceasing to subscribe to the races,
Mr. Holyoake proceeded to read his treatise, which he
had written on several slips of paper — apparently backs
of circulars — and laid one by one on a chair as he finish-
ed them.

The world, he said, is a big place ; but people are
always forgetting what a variety of humanity it contains.
Two hundred years ago, the authorities of Bedford made
it very unpleasant for one John Bunyan, because they
thought they knew everything, and could not imagine
that a common street workman might know more. The
trade of a tinker seems an unpromising preparation for
a literary career, A tinker in Bedford to-day would not
find himself much flattered by the attentions paid him,
esj^ecially if he happened to be an old jail-bird as well.
So much the more creditable to Bunyan the ascendancy
he gained. If he mended pots as well as he made
sentences he was the best tinker that ever travelled.

Bunyan had no worldly notions. His doctrine was

SECULARISM ON B UN VAN. 1 9 1

aat men were not saved by any good they might do-
doctrine that would ruin the morals of any commercial
stablishment in a month! He declared himself the
[ chief of sinners ; " but judged by his townsmen he was
ij. stout-hearted, stout-minded, scrupulous man.
ij He was not a pleasant man to know. He had an un-
ijelenting sincerity which often turned into severity. Yet
lehad much tenderness. He had a soul like a Red
ndian's— all tomahawk and truth, until the literar)'
)assion came and added humor to it. He demands in
lis vigorous doggerel : —

May I not write in such a style as this.

In such a method, too, and yet not miss

My end, thy good ? Why may it not be done ?

Dark clouds bring waters, when the bright bring none.

, Like all men of original genius, this stout-minded pot-
jmender had unbounded confidence in himself. He was
lunder no delusion as to his own powers. No man knew
Ibetter what he was about. He could take the measure
!0f all the justices about him, and he knew it. Every
shallow-headed gentleman in Bedfordshire towns and
jvillages was mide to wince under his picturesque and
Isatiric tongue. To clergymen, bishops, lawyers, and
'judges he gave names which all his neighbors knew.
Mr.'' Pitiless, Mr Hardheart, Mr. Forget-good, Mr. No-
truth, Mr. Haughty— thus he named the disagreeable
dignitaries of the town of Mansoul.
- At first he was regarded by his " pastors and masters "
I as a mere wilful, noisy, praying sectary. Very soon they
I discovered that he was a fighting preacher. As tinker
I or Christian he always had his sleeves turned up. When
he had to try his own cause he put in the jury-box Mr

TQ2 MYSTIC L07VD0A,

True-Heart, Mr. Upright, Mr. Hate-Bad, Mr. See-Trutii,
and other amiable persons. His witnesses were Mr.
Know-Ail, Mr. Tell-True, Mr. Hate-Lies, Mr. Vouch-
Truth, Mr. Did-See. His Town Clerk was Mr. Do-
Right, the Recorder was Mr. Conscience, the jailef*
was Mr. True-Man, Lord Understanding was on the
bench, and the Judge bears the dainty name of the
" Golden-headed Prince."

Bunyan's adversaries are always a bad set. They
live in Villain's Lane, in Blackmouth Street, or Blas-
phemer's Row, or Drunkard's Alley, or Rascal's Corner.
They are the sons of one Beastly, whose mother bore
them in Flesh Square : they live at the house of one
Shameless, at the sign of the Reprobate, next door to
the Descent into the Pit, whose retainers are Mr. Flatter,
Mr. Impiety, Mr. False-peace, Mr. Covetousness, who
are housed by one Mr. Simple, in Folly's Yard.

Bunyan had a perfect wealth of sectarian scurrility at
his command. His epithets are at times unquotable
and ferocious. When, however, his friends are at the
bar, the witnesses against them cornprise the choicest
scoundrels of all time — Mr. Envy, Mr. Pick-thank,
and others, whose friends are Lord Carnal-Delight,
Lord Luxurious, Lord Lechery, Sir Having Greedy, and
similar villanous people of quality. The Judge's name
is now Lord Hate-Good. The jury consist of Mr. No-
Good, Mr. Malice, Mr. Love-Lust, Mr. Live- Loose, Mr.
Heady, Mr. Hate-Light, Mr. Enmity, Mr. Liar, Mr;
Cruelty, and Mr, Implacable, with Mr. Blindman for :
Foreman.

Never was such an infamous gang impanelled. Ran-
cor and rage and vindictiveness, and every passion
awakened in the breasts of the strong by local insolence

SECULARISM ON BUN VAN.

93

and legal injustice, is supplied by Bunyan with epithets
of immense retaliative force. He is the greatest name-
maker among authors. He was a spiritual Comanche.
He prayed like a savage. He said himself, when de-
scribing the art of the religious rhetorician — an art of
which he was the greatest master of his time : —

You see the ways the fisherman doth take
To catch the fish ; what engines doth he make !
Behold ! how he engageth all his wits,
Also his snares, lines, angles, hooks, and nets ;
Yet fish there be that neither hook nor line,
Nor snare, nor net, nor engine can make thine;
They must be grop'd for, and be tickled too,
Or they will not be catch'd, whate'er you do.

Bunyan never tickled the sinner. It was not his way.
He carried a prong. He pricked the erring. He pub
lished a pamphlet to suggest what ought to be done to
holy pedestrians, whose difficulties lay rearward. He
put detonating balls under their feet which exploded as
they stepped and alarmed them along. He lined the
celestial road with horrors. If they turned their heads
they saw a fiend worse than Lot's wife who was merely
changed into a pillar of sweet all-preserving salt. Bun-
yan's unfortunate converts who looked back fell into a
pit filled with fire, where they howled and burnt for-
evermore.

Ah ! with what pleasure must the great Bedfordshire
artist have contemplated his masterly pages as day by
day he added to them the portrait of some new scoun-
drel, or painted wdth dexterous and loving hand the
wholesome outline of some honest man, or devised
some new phrase which like a new note or new color
would delight singer or painter for generations yet to

13

94

MYSTIC LONDON:

come. He must have strode proudly along his cell as
he put his praise and his scorn into imperishable
smiles.

But Bunyan had never been great had he been mere-
ly disagreeable. He had infinite wit in him. It was
his carnal genius that saved him. He wrote sixty books,
and two of them — the " SieTge of the Town of Mansoul "
and the " Pilgrim's Progress " — exceed all ever WTitten
for creative swiftness of imagination, racy English
speech, sentences of literary art, cunningness in dia-
logue, satire, ridicule, and surpassing knowledge of the
picturesque ways of the obscure minds of common men.
In his pages men rise out of the ground — they always
come up on an open space so that they can be seen.
They talk naturally, so that you know them at once ;
and they act without delay, so that you never forget
them. They surprise you, delight you, they interest
you, they instruct you, and disappear. They never
linger, they never weary you. Incidents new and
strange arise at every step in his story. The scene
changes like the men and their adventures. Now it is
field or morass, plain or bypath, bog or volcano, castle
or cottage, sandy scorching desert or cold river ; the
smoke of the bottomless pit or bright, verdant, delecta-
ble mountains and enchanted lands where there are no
bishops, no jails, and no tinkers j where aboundeth
grapes, calico, brides, eternal conversation, and trump- '
ets. The great magician's genius forsakes him when
he comes to the unknown regions, and he knoweth no
more than the rest of us. But while his foot is on the
earth he steps like a king among writers. His Christian
is no fool. He is cunning of fence, suspicious, sa-
gacious, witty, satirical, abounding in invective, and

SECULARISM ON BUNYAN. 195

aroad, bold, delicious insolence. Bye-Ends is a subtle,
evasive knave drawn with infinite skill.
i Had Bunyan merely preached the Gospel he had no
imore been remembered than thousands of his day who
are gratefully forgotten— had he prayed to this time he
had won no statue ; but his literary genius lives when
ithe preacher is very dead.

. He saw with such vividness that the very passions
and wayward moods of men stood apart and distinct in
his sight, and he gave names to them and endowed
them with their natural speech. He created new men
out of characteristics of mind, and sent them into the
world in shapes so defined and palpable that men know
them for evermore. It was the way of his age for
writers to give names to their adversaries. Bunyan im
itated this in his life of Mr. Badman. Others did this,
but Bunyan did it better than any man. His invention
was marvellous, and he had besides the faculty of the

dramatist.

If any man wrote the adventures of a Co-operator, he
would have to tell of his meeting with Mr. Obstinate,
. who will not listen to him, and wants to pull him back.
We all get the company of Mr. Pliable, who is per-
suaded without being convinced, who at the first splash
into difftculty crawls out and turns back with a coward-
ly adroitness. We have all encountered the stupidity of
Mr. Ignorance, which nothing can enlighten. We know
Mr. Turnaway, who comes from the town of Apostacy,
whose face we cannot perfectly see. Others merely
give names, he drew characters, he made the qualities
of his men speak ; you knew them by their minds bet-
ter than by their dress. That is why succeeding ages
have read the "Pilgrim's Progress," because the same

196 MYSTIC LONDON.

people who met that extraordinary traveller are always
turning up in the way of every man who has a separate
and a high purpose, and is bent upon carrying it out.
Manner^ change, but humanity has still its old ways.
It is because Bunyan painted these that his writing
lasts like a picture by one of the old masters who
painted for all time.

Such is an outline of the paper, which was interest-
ing from its associations, and only spoilt by the cough.
We had had Bunyan in pretty well every shape possible
during the last few weeks. Certainly one of the most
original is this which presents the man of unbounded
faith in the light of utter skepticism.

CHAPTER XXXI.

AL FRESCO INFIDELITY.

TN a series of papers like the present it is necessary,
every now and then, to pause and apologize, either
for the nature of the work in general, or for certain par-
ticulars in its execution calculated to shock good people
whose feelings one would wish to respect. Having so
long been engaged in the study of infidelity in London,
I may, perhaps, be permitted to speak with something
like authority in the matter; and I have no hesitation
in saying that I believe the policy of shirking the sub-
ject is the most fatal and foolish one that could be
adopted. Not only does such a course inspire people,
especially young people, with the idea that there is

AL FRESCO INFIDELITY. ir^y

something very fascinating in infidelity — something
, which, if allowed to meet their fc,aze, would be sure to
attract and convince them — than which nothing is
farther from the truth — not only so, however, but many
of the statements and most of the arguments which
sound plausibly enough on the gjib tongue of a popular
speaker read very differently indeed when put down in
icold-blooded letter-press, and published in the pages of
la book. I protest strongly against making a mystery of
London infidelity. It has spread and is spreading, I
know, and it is well the public should know; but I
believe there would be no such antidote to it as for
people to be fully made aware how and where it is
spreading. That is the role I have all along proposed
to myself ; not to declaim against any man or any sys-
tem, not to depreciate or disguise the truth, but simply
to describe. I cannot imagine a more legitimate method
of doing my work.

5 I suppose no one will regard it in any way as an
iRdulgence or a luxury on the part of a clergyman, who,
be it remembered, is, during a portion of the Sunday,
engaged in ministering to Christian people, that he
should devote another portion of that day to hearing
Christ vilified, and having his own creed torn to pieces.
I myself feel that my own belief is not shaken, but in a
I tenfold degree confirmed by all I have heard and seen
and written of infidelity; and therefore I cannot con-
cede the principle that to convey my experiences to
: others is in any way dangerous. Take away the halo of
mystery that surrounds this subject, and it would possess
very slender attractions indeed.

It was, for instance, on what has always appeared to
me among the mast affecting epochs of our Christian

igS MYSTIC LONDON. ^1

year, the Fifth Sunday after Easter — Christ's last Sun-
day upon earth — that, by one of those violent antitheses,
I went to Gibraltar Walk, Bethnal Green Road, to hear
Mr. Ramsey there demolish the very system which, for
many years, it has been my mission to preach. I did
not find, and I hope my congregation did not find, that
I faltered in my message that evening. I even venture
to think that Mr. Ramsey's statements, which I shall
repeat as faithfully as possible, will scarcely seem as
convincing here as they did when he poured them fortb
so fluently to the costermongers and navvies of the ■
Bethnal Green Road ; and if this be true of Mr. Ram-
sey it is certainly so of the smaller men ; for he is a /
master in his craft, and certainly a creditable antagonist ^:
for a Christian to meet with the mild defensive weapons ;
we have elected to use.

When the weather proves fine, as it ought to have done
in May, 1874, infidelity adjourns from its generally j
slummy halls to the street corners, and to fields which
are often the reverse of green ; thus adopting, let me
remark in passing, one of the oldest instrumentalities of
Christianity itself, one, too, in which we shall do well to
follow its example. Fas est ab hoste doceri — I cannot
repeat too often. Scorning the attractions of the rail-
way arches in the St. Pancras Road, where I hope soon
to be a listener, I sped via the Metropolitan Railway
and tram to Shoreditch Church, not far from which,
past the Columbia Market and palatial Model Lodging
Houses, is the unpicturesque corner called Gibraltar
Walk, debouching from the main road, with a triangulai
scrap of very scrubby ground, flanked by a low wall '
which young Bethnal Green is rapidly erasing from tht
face of the earth. When I got here, I found an uncleri

AL FRESCO INFIDELITY.

199

cal-looking gentleman in a blue great-coat and sandy
moustache erecting his rostrum in the shape of a small
deal stool, from whence I could see he was preparing
to pour forth the floods of his rhetoric by diligent study
of some exceedingly greasy notes which he held in his
hand, and perused at what I feel sure must have been
the windiest street corner procurable outside the cave
of T^olus. I fell back into the small but very far from
select crowd which had already begun to gather, and an
old man, who was unmistakably a cobbler, having ascer-
tained that I had come to hear the lecture, told me he
had " listened to a good many of 'em, but did not feel
much for'arder." Undismayed by this intelligence I
still elected to tarry, despite the cruel nor'-easter that
was whistling round the corner of the Bethnal Green
Road. In a few minutes I perceived a slight excite-
ment in the small gathering due to the fact that the
Christians had put in an appearance, so that there
would be some opposition. Mr. Harrington, a young
man whom I had heard once speak fluently enough on
the theistic side at an infidel meeting, was unpacking
his rostrum, which was a patent folding one, made of
deal, like that of his adversary, but neatly folded along
with a large Bible, inside a green baize case. Both
gentlemen commenced proceedings at the same time ;
and as they had pitched their stools very close to one
another, the result was very much like that of tw^o grind-
ing organs in the same street. Of the two, Mr. Har-
rington's voice was louder than Mr. Ramsey's. The
latter gentleman had a sore throat, and had to be kept
lubricated by means of a jug of water, which a brother
heretic held ready at his elbow. Mr. Harrington M^as
in prime condition, but his congregation was smaller

200 MYSTIC LONDON.

than ours ; for I kept at first — I was going to say relig-
iously, I suppose I ought to say /r-religiously — to the
infidels.

Mr. Ramsey, who had a rooted aversion to the letter
" h," except where a smooth breathing is usual, began
by saying that Christianity differed from other religions
in the fact of its having an eternal 'Ell. The Mahomet-
ans had their beautiful ladies ; the North American
Indian looked for his 'Appy 'Unting Grounds ; but 'Ell
was a specialty of the Christian system. On the other
side was the fact that you continually had salvation
inundated upon you. Tracts were put into your hand,
asking-—" What must I do to be saved ? " We had to
pay for this salvation about 11,000,000/. a year to the
Church of England, and something like an equal amount
to the Dissenters. In fact every tub thumper went
about preaching and ruining servant girls, and for this
we paid over twenty millions a year — more than the
interest on the whole National Debt. After this elegant
exordium, Mr. Ramsey said he proposed to divide his
remarks under four heads, i. Is Salvation necessary?
2. What are we to be saved from? 3. What for?
4. How?

I. According to the Christian theory, God, after an
eternity of " doin' nothin','' created the world. He
made Adam sin by making sin for him. to commit ; and
then damned him for doing what He knew he would do.
He predestined you — the audience — to be damned be-
cause of Adam's sin ; but after a time God " got sick
and tired of damning people," and sent His Son to re-
deem mankind.

This flower of rhetoric tickled Bethnal Green im-
mensely; but Mr. Harrington was equal to the occasion,

AL FRESCO INFIDELITY. 20i

'nd thundered out his orthodoxy so successfully that
,[i. Ramsay took a longer drink than usual, and com-
)lained that he was not having "a free platform "—it
vas so he dignified the rickety stool on which he was
Dcrched. He then meandered into a long dissection of
:jenesis i., appearing to feel particularly aggrieved by
:he fact of the moon being said to " rule the night,"
bough I could not see how this was relevant to the
hristian scheme of salvation ; and a superb policeman,
Uo had listened for a moment to Mr. Ramsey's astro-
nomical lucubrations, evidently shared my feelings and
passed on superciliously. I devoutly wished my duty
had permitted me to do the same.

The speaker then went into a long dissertation on
the primal sin ; the gist of which was that though
ilie woman had never been warned not to eat of the
Forbidden Fruit, she had to bear the brunt of the
punishment. Then— though one is almost ashamed
to chronicle such a triviality — he waxed very wroth
because the serpent was spoken of as being cursed
■above all "cattle." Who ever heard of snakes being
called cattle 1 . He was condemned to go on his belly.
How did he go before ? Did he go on his back or
« 'op " along on the tip of his tail ? These pleasan-
.|ries drew all Mr. Harrington's audience away except
a few little dirty boys on the wall. Mr. Ramsey
clearly knew his audience, and '' acted to the gallery."
2. But what were -we to be saved from ? Eternal
'Ell-fire. This 'Ell-fire was favorite sauce for ser-
mons, and served to keep people awake. Where was
'Ell? It was said to be a bottomless pit; if so, he
should be all right, because he could get out at the
other end ! Then, again, 'Ell was said to be a very

202 MYSTIC LONDON.

'ot place. When the missionaries told the Green
landers that, everybody wanted to go to 'Ell ; so they
had to change their tune and say it was very cold,
Mr. Ramsay omitted to mention his authority for this
statement.

Into his pleasantries on the monotony of life in
'Eaven, I do not feel inclined to follow this gentle-,
man. The Atonement, he went on to remark, if neces-
sary at all, came 4000 years too late. It should have!
been — so we were to believe on his ipse dixit — con-
temporaneous with the Fall. This atonement we were
to avail ourselves of by means of faith. Idiots could
not have faith, but were allowed to be saved. Conse-
quently, argued Mr. Ramsay, in conclusion, the best I'
thing for all of us would have been to have been born
idiots, and, consistently enough, Christianity tried tc
turn us all into idiots.

Such were some of the statements. I refrain from
quoting the most offensive, which were deliberate!)
put forward at this al fresco infidels' meeting ; and
with what result.? Though a vast population kepi
moving to and fro along that great highway, there
were never, I am sure, more than a hundred peopleij
gathered at the shrine of Mr. Ramsay. They laugliedr
at his profanities, yes j but directly he dropped these,
and grew argumentative, they talked, and had to be|;
vigorously reduced, to order. Gallio-like, they carecj
for none of these things, and I am quite sure a gooc|
staff of working clergymen like Mr. Body or Mr.li
Steele of St. Thomas', who could talk to the people.!
would annihilate Mr. Ramsay's prestige. As for Mr;||
Harrington, he meant well, and had splendid lung
power, but his theology was too sectarian to suit :j

AN '^INDESCRIBABLE PHENOMENON:' 203

mixed body of listeners, embracing all shades of
thought and no-thought.

Supposing Mr. Ramsey to have put forth all his
power that morning — and I have no reason to doubt
that he did so — I deliberately say that I should not
hesitate to take my own boy down to hear him, because
I feel that even his immature mind would be able to
realize how little there was to be said against Chris-
tianity, if that were all

CHAPTER XXXII.

AN "indescribable PHENOMENON."

X 1[ ^HEN the bulk of the London Press elects to gush
over anything or anybody, there are, at all events,
prima fade grounds for believing that there is something
to justify such a consensus. When, moreover, the ob-
ject of such gush is a young lady claiming to be a spirit-
medium, the unanimity is so unusual as certainly to
make the matter worth the most careful inquiry, for
hitherto the London Press has either denounced spiritu-
alism altogether, or gushed singly over individual
mediums, presumably according to the several proclivi-
ties of the correspondents. Of Miss Annie Eva Fay,
however — is not the very name fairy-like and fascinating.?
— I read in one usually sober-minded journal that " there
is something not of this earth about the young lady's
powers." Another averred that she was "a spirit me-
dium of remarkable and extraordinary power." Others,

204 MYSTIC LOXDOmV.

more cautious, described the "mystery" as "bewilder-
ing," the "entertainment" as "extraordinary and in-
comprehensible," while yet another seemed to me to
afford an index to the cause of this gush by saying that
" Miss Fay is a pretty young lady of about twenty, with
a delicate spirituelle face, and a profusion of light hair,
frizzled on the forehead.

I made a point of attending Miss Annie Eva Fay's
opening performance at the Hanover Square Rooms,
and found all true enough as to the pretty face and the
frizzled hair. Of the " indescribable " nature of the
"phenomenon " (for by that title is Miss Fay announced
a la Vincent Crummies) there may be two opinions,
according as we regard the young lady as a kind of
Delphic Priestess and Cumaean Sibyl rolled into one,
or simply a clever conjuror — conjuress, if there be such
a word.

Let me, then, with that .delightful inconsistency so
often brought to bear on the so-called or self-styled
" supernatural," first describe the " indescribable," and
then, in the language of the unspiritual Dr. Lynn, tell
how it is all done ; for, of course, I found it all out, like a
great many others of the enlightened and select audience
which gathered at Miss Annie Eva Fay's first drawing-
room reception in the Queen's Concert Rooms.

Arriving at the door half an hour too early, as I had
misread the time of commencement, I found at the
portal Mr. Burns, of the Progressive Library, and a gen-
tleman with a diamond brooch in his shirt-front, whom I
guessed at once, from that adornment, to be the pro-
prietor of the indescribable phenomenon, and I was,
in fact, immediately introduced to him as Colonel Fay.

Passing in due course within the cavernous room

A,V '' IXDESCRIBABLE PFJENGMEiYON." 205

which might have suited well a Cumaean Sibyl on a
small scale, I found the platform occupied by a tiny
cabinet, unlike that of the Davenports in that it was
open in front, with a green curtain, which I could see was
destined to be let down during the performance of the
phenomenal manifestations. There was a camp-stool
inside the cabinet ; a number of cane-bottomed chairs on
the platform, and also the various properties of a spirit
stance, familiar to me from long experience, guitar,
fiddle, handbells, tambourine, &c. One adjunct alone
was new ; and that was a green stable bucket, destined, I
could not doubt, to figure in what my Rimmel-scented pro-
gramme promised as the climax of Part I. — the " Great
Pail Sensation." Presently Colonel Fay, in a brief
speech, nasal but fluent, introduced the subject, and
asked two gentlemen to act as a Committee of In-
spection. Two stepped forward immediately — indeed
too immediately, as the result proved ; one a " citizen of
this city," as Colonel Fay had requested ; but the other
a Hindoo young gentleman, who, I believe, lost the con-
fidence of the audience at once from his foreign face and
Oriental garb. However, they were first to the front,
and so were elected, and proceeded at once to " ex-
amine" the cabinet in that obviously helpless and
imperfect way common to novices who work with
the gaze of an audience upon them. Then, from a
side door, stage left, enter the Indescribable Pheno-
menon. A pretty young lady, yes, and with light
frizzled hair to any extent. There was perhaps " a spirit
look within her eyes ; " but then I have often found this
to be the case with young ladies of t\venty. Her dress
of light silk was beyond reproach. I had seen
Florence Cook and Miss Showers lately ; and, — well, I

2o6 MYSTIC LONDON.

thought those two, with the assistance of Miss Annie
Eva Fay, would have made a very pretty model for a
statuette of the Three Graces.

Miss Fay, after being described by the Colonel vaguely
enough as " of the United States," was bound on both
wrists with strips of calico ; the knots were sewn by the
European gentleman, as distinguished from the Asiatic
youth. He was not quite aufait at the needle, but got
through it in time. Miss Fay was then placed on the
camp-stool, her wrists fastened behind her, and her neck
also secured to a ring screwed into the back of the
cabinet. A rope was tied round her ankles, and passed
right to the front of the stage, where the Hindoo youth
was located and bidden hold it taut, which he did con-
scientiously, his attitude being what Colman describes
" like some fat gentleman who bobbed for eels."

First of all, another strip of calico was placed loosely
round Miss Fay's neck ; the curtain descended. Hey,
presto ! it was up again, sooner than it takes to write,
and this strip was knotted doubly and trebly round her
neck. A tambourine hoop was put in her lap, and this,
in like manner, was found encircling her neck, as far as
the effervescent hair would allow it.

The audience at this point grew a little fidgety ; and
though they did not say anything against the Oriental
young gentleman, the 'cute American colonel understood
it, adding two others from the audience to the committee
on the stage, and leaving the young gentleman to
" bob " down below as if to keep him out of mischief, t

The other " manifestations " were really only differ-
ent in detail from the first. The guitar was placed on
the lap, the curtain fell and it played ; so did the fiddle ;^
— out of tune, as usual — and also a little glass harmoni-

AN ''INDESCRIBABLE PHENOMENON." 207

con with actually a soup9on of melody. A mouth-
organ tootle-tooed, and what Colonel Fay described ay
a " shingle nail " was driven with a hammer into a
piece of wood. A third of a tumbler of water laid on
the lap of the Indescribable Phenomenon was drunk,
and the great Pail Sensation consisted in the bucket
being put on her lap and then discovered slung by the
handle around her neck. Tlie last " manifestation " is
the one to which I would draw attention ; for it was by
this I discovered how it was all done. A knife was put on
Miss Fay's lap ; the curtain lowered, the knife pitched
on to the platform, and behold the Indescribable Pheno-
menon stepped from the cabinet with the ligature that
had bound her wrists and neck severed.

Now, all through this portion of the entertainment the
audience, instead of sitting quiet, amused themselves
with proposing idiotic tests, or suggesting audibly how
it was all done. One man behind me pertinaciously
clung to the theoiy of a concealed boy, and trotted him
to the front after every phase of the exhibition. He must
have been inhnitesimally small ; but that did not mat-
ter. It was " that boy again " after every trick. One
manifestation consisted in putting a piece of paper and
pair of scissors on Miss Fay's lap, and having several
*• tender little infants '' cut out, as the Colonel phrased it.

Hereupon sprang up a 'cute individual in the room,
and produced a sheet of paper he had marked. Would
Miss Fay cut out a tender little infant from that.^ Miss
Fay consented, and of course did it, the 'cute individ-
ual retiring into private life for the rest of the evening. ^
Another wanted Miss Fay's mouth to be bound with a *
handkerchief, and there was no objection raised, until
the common-sense and humanity of the audience pro-

2o8 MYSTIC LONDON.

tested against such a needless cruelty on a broiling
night and in that Cumsean cave. An excited gentle-
man in front of me, too, whose mission I fancy was
simply to protest against the spiritual character of the
phenomena (which was never asserted) v/ould interrupt
us all from time to time by declaring his intense satis-
faction with it all. It was a splendid trick. We tried
to convince him that his individual satisfaction was
irrelevant to us, but it was, as Wordsworth says, " Throw-
ing words away." It was a beautiful trick ; and he was
satisfied, quite satisfied.

The Dark Seance, which formed the second part of
the performance, was a dreadful mistake. It was not
only unsatisfactory in result, but — and no doubt this
v/as the reason — it was so mismanaged as to threaten
more than once to eventuate in a riot. Twelve or four-
teen persons were to form a committee representing the
audience, and to sit in a circle, with the Indescribable
Phenomenon in their centre, while we remained below
in Egyptian darkness and received their report. Of
course we all felt that we — -if not on the committee —
might just as well be sitting at home or in the next
parish as in the cave of Cumae. The method of elect-
ing the committee was briefly stated by Colonel Fay to
be " first come first served," and the consequence was a
rush of some fifty excited people on to the platform,
with earnest requests on the part of the proprietary to
be " still." There was no more stillness for the rest of
the evening. The fifty were pruned down to about fif-
teen of the most pertinacious, who would not move at
any price ; in fact, the others only descended on being
promised that the dark sitting should be divided into
two, and another committee appointed. The Inde-

A.V ''INDESCRIBABLE PHENOI^IENONr 209

_scribable Phenomenon took her seat on the camp-
stool in the centre, where she was to remain chipping
her hands, to show she was not producing the manifes-
stations. The gas was put out and darkness prevailed
!- — darkness, but not silence. The disappointed and
rejected committee men — and women — first began to
grumble in the freedom which the darkness secured.
The committee was a packed one. They were Spirit-
ualists. This was vigorously denied by somebody, who
said he saw a Press man in the circle, and therefore
(such was his logic) he could not be a Spiritualist. All
this time the Indescribable Phenomenon was clapping
her hands, and now some of the more restless of the
audience clapped theirs in concert. The guitar and fid-
dle began to thump and twang, and the bells to ring,
and then again the more refractory lunatics amongst
us began to beat accompaniment on our hats. The
whole affair was worthy of Bedlam or Hanwell, or,
let us add, an Indescribable Phenomenon.

The committee was changed with another rush, and
those who were finally exiled from the hope of sitting
took it out in the subsequent darkness by advising us
to " beware of "our pockets." When Colonel Fay asked
for quietude he was rudely requested " not to talk
through his nose." It was not to be wondered at
that the seance was very brief, and the meeting ad-
journed.

Now to describe the indescribable. If it be a spir-
itual manifestation, of course there is an end of the
matter ; but if a mere conjuring trick, I would call at-
tention to the following facts : The fastening of Miss
Fay's neck to the back of the cabinet at first is utterly
gratuitous. It offers no additional difficulty to any

14

210 MYSTIC LONDON.

manifestations, and appears only intended to prevent
the scrutineers seeing beliind her. A very simple exer- .|
cise of sleight-of-hand would enable the gallant Colo-
nel to cut the one ligature that binds the two wrists,
when, for instance, he goes into the cabinet with scis-
sors to trim off the ends of the piece of calico in^ the
opening trick. The hands being once free, all else is
easy. The hands are never once seen during the per-
formance. The committee can feel them, and feel the
knots at the wrists ; but they cannot discover whether
the ligature connecting the wrists is entire.

The last trick, be it recollected, consists in the liga-
ture being cut and Miss Fay's coming free to the front.
If my theory is incorrect — and no doubt it is ruinously
wrong — will she consent to omit the last trick and come '
to the front with wrists bound as she entered the cabi-
net ? Of course, if I had suggested it, she would have ,|
done it as easily as she cut out the tender infants for the \
'cute gentleman behind me ; so, to adopt the language
of Miss Fay's fellow-citizen, I " bit in my breath and
swallered it down." I adopted the course Mr. Maske-
lyne told me he did with the Davenports, sat wdth my
eyes open and my mouth shut. It is marvellous to see
how excited we phlegmatic islanders grow when either
spirits are brought to the front, or we think we have
found out a conjuring trick. I am not going to follow^
the example of my gushing brethren, but I can safely !|
say that if anybody has an afternoon or evening to'
spare, he may do worse than go to the Cr}^stal Palace
or the Hannover Square Rooms, to see a very pretty and',
indescribable phenomenon, and to return as I did, %l
wiser, though perhaps a sadder man, in the proud con-i*
sciousness of having "found out how it is all done."

Ji

A LADY MESMERIST. 2 1 1

CHAPTER XXXIII.

A LADY MESMERIST.

"X 1 /"HEN a man's whole existence has resolved itself
into hunting up strange people and poking his
nose into queer nool<LS and corners, he has a sorry time
of it in London during August ; for, as a rule, all the
funny folks have gone out of town, and the queer nooks
and corners are howling wildernesses. There is always,
of course, a sort of borderland, if he can only find it
out ; some peculiar people who never go out of town,
some strange localities which are still haunted by them ;
only he has to find them out — people and places — for
it is so universally allowed now-a-days that all genteel
people must be out of London in August, and all re-
spectable places must be covered up in old newspapers,
that it is difficult to get them to own the soft impeach-
ment.

However, there is one queer place that is never shut
up, the Progressive Library in Southampton Row ; and
Mr. Burns and the Spiritualists, as a rule, do not shut
up shop even in August. Their Summerland lies else-
where than Margate or the Moors ; and a valse with a
pirouetting table, or a little gentle levitation or elonga-
tion, delights them more than all the revels of the
countryside. I was getting a little blase, I own, on the
subject of Spiritualism, after my protracted experiences
during the Conference ; and I do not think I should
have turned my steps in the direction of the Progressive

2J2 MYSTIC LONDON.

Institution that week, had not the following announce-
ment caught my eye as I scanned the ghostly pages of
tht Medium and Daybreak :■ —

"a mesmeric seance."

"We have been authorized to announce that Miss
Chandos, "whose advertisement appears in another part
of this paper, will give a mesmeric seance at the Spiritual
Institution, 15 Southampton Row, on Wednesday even-
ing, August 19th, at eight o'clock. Admission will be
free by ticket,. which may be obtained at the Institution.
The object which Miss Chandos has in view is to inter-
est a few truth-seekers who could aid her in promoting
a knowledge of psychological phenomena. As a crowded
meeting is not desired, an early application should be
made for tickets."

I do not know that I said " Eureka ! " Indeed, I
have considerable historic doubts as to whether anybody
ever did, but I felt it. I was a truth-seeker forthwith.
I was resolved to sit at the feet of Miss Chandos, and,
should her mesmeric efforts prove satisfactory, " aid
her in promoting a knov.dedge of psychological phenom-
ena." I did not go through the prescribed process of
getting a ticket beforehand, because I thought, in my
innocence, that everybody would be out of town, or that
the hall of the Progressive Institute would certainly
accommodate those who remained. Never was a more
fatal mistake. The psychological folks were all in
London, and the capacities of the Progressive Library
are not palatial. Miss Chandos had a crowded meet-
ing, whether she desired it or not. Genius will not be
concealed : and Miss Chandos was learning that lesson

A LADY MESMERIST. 213

in a very satisfactory way. It was a sultry evening
when a small boy opened the back door of the little
first floor apartment in Southampton Row, and squeezed
me in like the thirteenth in an omnibus, and I found
myself walking on people's toes, and sitting down on
their hats in the most reckless manner. At length,
however, I struggled to a vacant corner, and deposited
myself perspiring and expectant.

Mr. Burns was " orating " on the revival mesmerism
was destined to make, and telling us how, like the Plum-
stead Peculiars, we should be able to do without doc-
tors as soon as the healing powers of animal magnetism
were properly recognized and diffused. I did not listen
very carefully, I fear, for I was nervously looking
about for Miss Chandos. Nervously, I say, because
lady mediums and mesmerizers are so apt to run to eight-
een stone, or be old and frumpish, that I had terrible
fears lest I should be scared when I met Miss Chandos
in the flesh. I was very agreeably surprised, however,
for when Mr. Burns resumed — not his chair, but his
table, since he sat on that article of furniture — a very
pretty young lady indeed, of not more than eighteen or
twenty years of age, took his place, and, in a few well-
chosen words, said this was her first appearance as a
public mesmerist, and claimed indulgence should any
failure in the phenomena result. She also drew atten-
tion to the fact that the apartment was "pernicious
snug " (she put it, of course, in more scientific language),
and straightway proceeded to business.

When Miss Chandos invited patients to put them-
selves in her hands, I thought the room had risen en
masse. Ever3?body wanted to be mesmerized. I had
no chance, in my retired position ; but she soon got a

214 MYSTIC LONDON.

front row of likely people, and I sat down once more,
disappointed and exuding.

She was a tall, active young lady was Miss Chandos,
and had a mystic crop of long black curls, which waved
about like the locks of a sybil when she made a lunge
at an innocent-looking young man who sat No. i — and
whom, with the other patients, I shall designate thus
numerically. He seemed to like it immensely, and
smiled a fatuous smile as those taper fingers lighted on
his head, while the other hand rested on the frontal
portion of his face, as though Miss Chandos were going
to pull his nose. He was off in a moment, and sat
facing the audience in his magnetic trance, looking like
a figure at a wax-work show. Miss Chandos then
passed on to a gentleman, No. 2, who never succumbed
during the entire evening, though she made several
onslaughts on him. Consequently I dismiss No. 2 as
incorrigible fortliwith. No. 3 was a lady, who only gave
way after a lengthened attack, and did not seem to
appreciate the effect of Miss Chandos' lustrous eyes so
much as No. i did. He gave signs of " coming to,"
but Miss Chandos kept looking round at him and at
No. 2, while she was attending to No. 3, and directly
she did this No. i closed his eyes, and slept the sleep
of innocence again.

Having reduced No. 3 to a comatose condition. Miss
Chandos reverted to No. i, and, by attractive passes,
got him on his legs, and made him follow her up and
down the limited space at her disposal. She looked
then like a pretty Vivien manipulating a youthful Mer-
lin ; and I was not at all surprised at the effect of her
"woven paces and her waving hands." She asked him
his name, and he told her. It was W . " No," she

A LAJ)y MESMERJS T. 215

Wid " it's Jones. Mary Jones. What's your name ? "
but the youth was not quite so far gone as to rebaptize
ihimself with a female cognomen just yet. He stuck to
Ibis W , and Miss Chandos put him into his waxwork
.'position again, and got No. 3 on her legs at last, but did
Inothing more with her than malce her walk up and
Idown. Presently No. 3 woke up, and was put to air at

the window. , u- u 1

No 4 was now selected, in the person of a big burly
man ; and I could not help thinking, as she mampulated
him, what a capital pose it would have been for Hercules
and Omphale. He seemed to like it exceedingly, and,
I thought, was dropping comfortably off, when he whis-
pered something to his operator (I have no notion wha
Ihe feminine of that word is), who fixed her brilliant
eyes on somebody near me-I feared it was actually
o„ „e-and said, " Somebody at the back of the room
is exercising control. I shall be glad if they will re-
frain " I was quite innocent of exercising conscious
control, and did not quite know what the phrase meant.
I certainly had once or twice thought it must be much
pleasanter to be operated upon by so pretty a young lady
than by some bull-necked male mesmerist or aged
spinster above mentioned ; but I could scarcely believe
that such a mild sentiment could affect that colossal
man However, I recollected the delicacy o. these
psychological relations, and sat down conscience-stricken
and warmer than ever.

Miss Chandos selected No. 5 in the person of a young
man with a nascent mustache, who had successfully
strucTled into the front row at the outset. He promised
welUt first; but, like other young men with incipient
mustaches, disappointed us afterwards. Then came
No. 6 uDon the scene.

2i6 MYSl'IC LOXDOJV.

No. 6 was a lady who came late, and at once pushed
to the front with the air of a person who was not doing
so for the first time. She went oif in a moment— far
too suddenly, in fact, and then did everything she was
■ 'Id in a very obedient way. Being told that she was
in a beautiful garden, she stooped down on the floral
carpet and proceeded to gather materials for a bouquet.
I confess I did not care about No. 6, and was proceed-
ing to read Professor Tyndall's Belfast Address, which
I had in my pocket, when Miss Chandos looked up No.
I again.

Reduced to a proper frame of mind, either by Miss
Chandos' continued attentions or the contagion of No.
6's docility, the youth was now all submission. He
walked up and down any number of times like a tam.e
animal at the Zoological Gardens, and now quite agreed
that his name was Mary Jones. He sang "Tom Bow-
ling" at command, and No. 6, not to be outdone, war-
bled a ditty called, I think, "The Slave Girl's Love,"
the refrain of which, according to her version, was, " I
cannot love, because I ha?n a slave." She broke down
m the middle of this aspiring ditty, and then personated
a Jew old clo' man, a woman selling " ornaments for
your firestoves," and various other characters, all of
which she overacted considerably. I may be wrong, of
course, but I fancied the fair lecturess was as dissatis-
fied with No. 6 as I was. The audience was an indul-
gent one, and thought it splendid. Mr. Burns sat on
the table and yawned. I relapsed into Tyndall, and
wondered what he would have said about it all ; or, at
least, I did not wonder, for I knew he would have con-
signed us all to the nearest lunatic asylum as exceptions
to the rule that the European has sJ many more cubic
mches of cerebral development than the Papuan.

A LADY MESMERIST. 217

When it was drawing near ten, Miss Chandos brought
the iDroceedings to a close by animating — like Pygma-
lion— her waxwork statues. She apologized once more,
in a few well-chosen sentences, for what she was pleased
to call her "failure,'' but. the audience would not hear
of the term, and applauded to the echo, only there was
no room for an echo in the Progressive Institute. The
young man. No. i, v. ho I found was a spirit medium,
wound up by an address from his Indian guide on the
subject of " control."

I confess I failed to gather from the perambulating
youth and maidens No. i and 3, or the impersonations
of No. 6, any signs of the revival alluded to by Mr.
Burns at the outset; and there was not the remotest
connexion with the healing art. In fact, nobody seemed
suffering from anything except heat.

Miss Chandos said to me, however, in a sensible con-
versation with which she favored me in private, that all
she had attempted to show w^as but the lowest manifesta-
tion of a power which had far higher ends in view. She
doubted almost whether it was not something like
sacrilege to use such a power for playing tricks and
gratifying curiosity.

She was thoroughly in earnest ; and labored both
physically during the evening and logically in her after
discourse, with an energy which some persons would
have said was worthy of a better cause.

It was nearly eleven when I left the miniature hall of
the Progressive Institute, and as I passed along the
streets, digesting what I had seen and heard during the
evening, I took myself to task severely — as it is always
well to do, if only to prevent somebody else doing it for
me — and asked whether, if the lecturess had not been a

2 T 8 MYSTIC LONDON.

lecturess but a lecturer — if being a lecturess she weighed
eighteen stone, or was old and wizen, or dropped her
h's — whether I should have stayed three mortal hours
in that stuffy room, and I frankly own I came to the
conclusion I should not.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

A PSYCHOPATHIC INSTITUTION.

"O EADING my Figaro the other day — as I hope I
need not state it is my custom devoutedly to do —
I came upon the following passage in the review of a
book called " Psychopathy ; or, the True Healing Art.
By Joseph Ashman. London : Burns, Southampton
Row. We have not the pleasure of being personally
acquainted with Joseph Ashman, and we fear that the
loss is ours. Judging him through the medium of his
book, he must, indeed, be a rara avis. . . . The
one great thing," it went on to say, " that Joseph Ash-
man wants the world to know is, that he cures diseases
by very simple means. And all that the world wants to
know from Joseph Ashman is, Are these cures real — are
his statements facts ? Why, then, does not Joseph con-
tent himself with his facts? He has plenty of them.
Here i-s one — ' Seeing one day a cabman with a swollen
face standing by a police court ready to prosecute a man
who had assaulted him, I asked if, on condition I healed
him, he would forgive his adversary. He repHed that
he would, and we accordingly got into his cab together.

A FS YCHOPA THIC INS TITUTION. 2 1 9

fringing out the magnetized carte, I told him to look ar
it, and at the same time made a few motions over the
swelling with my hand. I then left him feeling much
better, and returned in an hour's time, when I found
him taking'a glass of beer with his antagonist, whom he
had forgiven.' "

Now as the one pursuit and end of my present exist-
ence is the discovery of rarce aves, I need not say T at
once took up the clue herein afforded, and went in pur-
suit of Joseph Ashman. I found not only him but his
institution, for Mr. Ashman does not work single hand-
ed. It is in the Marylebone Road, almost opposite the
Yorkshire Stingo ; and is most modest and unpretend-
ing in its outward semblance, being situated in one of
those semi-rustic houses so indicative of suburban Lon-
don, down an overstocked garden, into which you enter
by means of a blistered iron gate, painted violently
green, and swinging heavily on its hinges. Down a
vista of decrepit dahlias one sped to the portal, along-
side which was a trio of bell-handles, one above the
other, showing that the Psychopathic Institution did not
occupy the -whole even of that modest domicile. I al-
ways approach these manifold bells with considerable
diffidence, conscious that I must inevitably ring the
wrong one ; so, on this occasion, I rang none at all, but
knocked a faint double knock on the knocker by way of
compromise — very faint, indeed, lest I should disturb
any patients who were being " psychopathized." While
I waited I had leisure to observe that hidden among the
dahlias, and thatched over as it were with a superan-
nuated costermonger's barrow, was a double perambu-
lator, which set me calculating the probabilities of Mr.
Ashman being a family man.

220 MYSTIC LONDON.

The door was opened before I had settled the point
to my own mental satisfaction by a short, cheery-look-
ing man, with long, straight flaxen hair flowing down
over the shoulders of his black frock-coat, a beard
a few shades lighter, and a merry twinkling eye,
which looked more sympathetic than psychopathic, and
I should think was calculated to do patients good the
moment it lighted on them. He looked as much as to
ask whether I was psychopathically wrong, when I in-
formed him that I had not come as a patient, but simply
to inspect his institution if he would permit me. The
permission was at once accorded. " We are hard at
work," he said, as he ushered me into the front parlor,
" but come in and see what we are about."

A man who looked like a respectable artisan was sit-
ting at a table ; and a second, in his shirt sleeves, was
astride of a chair in what appeared to be rather an
idiotic ride-a-cock-horse-to-Banbury-Cross fashion, and
Mr. Ashman v/as pinching him and prodding him as
butchers do fat animals at the Smithfield Show.

" That there gentleman," said Mr. Ashman, in a
broad provincial dialect, "couldn't get astride that chair
when he came here half-an-hour ago. How d'ye feel
now, sir ? "

" Feel as though I should like to race somebody twenty-
rods for five pound a-side," answered the patient, getting
up and walking about the room as if it were a new sen-
sation. He had been brought, it appeared, to Mr. Ash-
man by his friend, who was an old psycopathic patient.
He assured me he had suffered from rheumatism for
twenty years, and was completely disabled without his
stick until he came into that room half-an-hour since.
He walked up and down stickless and incessantly as
the carnivora at the Zoo all the time he v/as telling me.

A PS YCHOPA THIC INS TITUTION. 2 2 1

" Would you mind putting your ear to this man's
back, sir? "said Mr. Ashman to me. I did so ; and when
he bent, his backbone seemed to go off with a lot of
little cracks like the fog-signals of a railway. " That
there old rusty hinge we mean to grease." And away
he went psychopathizing him again. When he was
done, Mr. Ashman explained to me learnedly, and with
copious illustrations from anatomical plates, his theoiy
of this disease, which was his favorite one for treat-
ment, because it yielded rapidly. Paralysis and that
class of disease arc nuich slower. He had succeeded
in acute rheumatism and also in calculus. "I like fat
men — fighting men to heal," he said. "I leave the
delicate ones to others." The sturdy little psychopath-
ist looked healthy enough to heal a sick rhinoceros.

While he was lecturing me his hands were not idle,
I should think they seldom were. He was pouring
salad oil from a flask on to flannel to give to the other
man who was sitting at the table, and had approached
convalescence from a chronic disease after one or two
visits, and who used this oiled flannel to keep up the
influence. Both the men seemed perfectly genuine ;
and the rheumatic gentleman, when he left, pronounced
the effect of his psychopathizing miraculous. The fee
was five shillings. " I shan't charge you nothin' for
the flannel," he said to No. 2. I began to take quite a
fancy to Joseph Ashman, and thanked Figaro inwardly
for directing me to the mstitution.

A working woman who was next in the little row of
patients assembled in the back room, came in with her
wrists bound up in bits of flannel, and her hands look-
ing puffed and glazy. She, too, had lost the use of
them for six years, she told me, and had been pro-

222 MYSTIC L ONDON.

nounced incurable by the doctors. This was her fourth
visit to Mr. Ashman. " Take up the chair, ma'am," he
said to his patient ; and she did carry it in rather a
wobbly fashion across the room, " Now the other
hand," and she did it with the other hand. "Now
show the gentleman how you did it when you came to
me. She's rather hard o' hearin'," he explained to me j
but after one or two repetitions the poor old body com-
prehended, and carried it in her crooked elbow. " Now
1^11 call my assistant," he said, and summoned a ruddy,
red-bearded man, who looked as though he might have
just come in from a brisk country walk. " When these
eases require a good deal of rubbing, I let my assistants
do the preliminary work, and then come in as the Heal-
ing Medium myself." The rubbers, he infonned me,
like the Medium, must be qualified, not only physi-
cally, but morally. Benevolence was the great requi-
site ; and certainly both these men seemed running over
with it, if looks meant anything. When Joseph Ash-
man took his turn, working the poor old patient's stiff
wrists, and pulling her fingers till they cracked, like
children playing " sweethearts," she never winced, but
actually seemed to like it, and trotted off well satisfied
with her fourth instalment of good health.

The next rubber who was introduced to me was not
such a ruddy man, being, in fact, rather saturnine in
appearance ; but I could quite understand that he was,
as he described himself, brimful of electricity. His
chevelure was like that on the little man we stick on the
conductor of an electrical machine and make each par-
ticular hair stand on end like quills upon the fretful
porcupine.

I could not for the life of me see the difference be*

A PS YCHOPA THTC INS TITUTIOiY. 223

tween' this treatment and simple mesmerism, except
that it was much more rapid in its effects than any-
magnetic treatment I have ever witnessed. Indeed, I
frankly confess I do not understand it novi^, though Mr.
Ashman made me accept one of his little books on
Psychopathic healing, and told me I should see the dis-
tinction when I read it. I must be very dense, for I
have read it diligently through, and still fail to trace the
distinction.

The man made a great impression on me. I felt he
was just one of those who would carry life into a sick
room, and communicate vital power — supposing it to be
communicable — from the dumpy fingers of his fat,
soft hand. The perambulator did not belie him.
Numbers of pretty black-eyed children were running
about, and there was a Mrs. Ashman somewhere among
the poor patients in the back room. All the children
came to me except the eldest boy, who, his father told
me in a mysterious tone, had suffered some indignity at
the hands of my cloth, and dreaded a parson ever
after. I believe my injudicious brother had set him a
long task (perhaps his Duty to his Neighbor), and the
poor lad was always afraid he should be dropped down
upon to " say it." Mr. Ashman's book is a little be-
wildering to an outsider who fails to distinguish the two
vital forces. He says : " It is much rarer to find a
high development of a temperament in which the psy-
chical element prevails, than in which it is well blended
with the vital-magnetic, or than in wdiich the latter ex-
cels. In nearly all popular public men there is a blend-
ing of the two. We see it well exemplified in John
Bright, Spurgeon and others. This is the secret of
their drawing, magnetic power. It is the secret, too, of

224 MYSTIC LONDON:

many a physician's success ; his genial magnetism
cures when his medicine is useless, although, of course,
he does not know it. As is the difference between
these two forces, so is the -difference in the method of
their employment for the purpose of cure." However,
when I left I promised — and I mean to keep my vow-
that if ever I am unfortunate enough to find my verte-
brae creaking " like an old hinge," I will come to Mr.
Ashman and have it greased. The remark in his book
as to the success of medicine depending on the quali-
ties of him who administered it was, we may recollect,
confirmed at the 1874 meeting of the British Associa-
tion in Belfast.

Joseph Ashman has had a chequered history. He
has dwelt in the tents of the Mormonites; has been
one of the Pecuhar People. In early life he was in
service in the country, where his master used to flog
him until, to use his own expression, he nearly cut him
in two. His earliest patients were cattle. " For a
healer," he said, " give me a man as can clean a win-
dow or scrub a floor. Christ himself, when he chose
those who were to be healers as well as preachers, chose
fishermen, fine, deep chested men depend upon it, sir,"
and he rapped upon his own sonorous lungs until they
reverberated. He was certainly blessed with a super-
abundance of good health, and looked benevolent
enough to impart all his surplus stock to anybody who
wanted it.

A PHRENOLOGICAL EVENING 225

CHAPTER XXXV.

A PHRENOLOGICAL EVENING.

nPHE experience I am about to chronicle occurred
•^ when the Beecher-Tilton scandal was at its height ;
and I was attracted by tlie somewhat ambiguous title
" Burns upon Beecher."

Mr. James Burns, the spirited proprietor of the Pro-
gressive Library, Southampton Row, having devoted
himself to the study of phrenology, has for some time
past held a series of craniological sea?ices on Tuesday
evenings, at which he " takes off " the head of some
well-known person, or your own, if you like, whether you
are well-known or born to blush unseen, not in the way
of physical decapitation, but by the method of phrenolo-
gical diagnosis. I greatly regretted having, on a pre-
vious occasion, missed the analysis of Dr. Kenealy's
cerebral developments. I believe the Claimant himself
was once the object of Mr. Burns' remarks ; but when
Mr. Beecher's cranium was laid down for dissection at
the height of the Beecher-Tilton sensation_, I could resist
no longer, but, despite all obstacles, repaired to the
Institute of Progress.

x\bout a score of people were gathered in that first-
floor front where I had seen so many strange things.
Of these persons some formed the regular phrenological
class conducted there weekly by Mr. Burns. The others
were, generally speaking, of the ordinary lecture-audience
type. One stout lady occupied an easy-chair in a corner,
and slept from first to last.

226 MYSTIC LONDON.

The first part of the lecture was a little discursive,
I fancy for my especial benefit, and summarized Mr.
Burns' system, which is to a great extent original.
Beginning by a disavowal of all dogmas, he began by-
advancing what was to me the entirely novel doctrine,
that the brain was not the sole organ of the mind, but
that the whole organism of man had to be taken into
account in the diagnosis of character, since the entire
body was permeated with the mind. The bones, fluids,
and viscera were all related to mental phenomena. The
lecturer even questioned whether the science he pro-
mulgated was properly termed phrenology. It certainly
did not answer to the conventional idea of that craft.
Referring to a calico diagram which was pinned to the
curtains of the first-floor front, and at which he pointed
with a walking-stick, Mr. Burns notified four divisions
of the animal frame — i, the vital organs ; 2, the mechan-
ical ; 3, the nervous (which in the lower orders were
ganglionic only); 4, the cerebral apparatus. He de-
fended the animal powers from the debased idea usually
attached to them, and pointed out their close connexion
with the spirit, nearer to which they were placed than
any portion of the economy.

He then proceeded to apply his preliminary remarks
to preachers in general. Theodore Parker, for instance,
was a man of spare body and large brain. He was sur-
rounded by intellectual people, and his disciples were
quite sui genet-is. On the other hand, Spurgeon was a
man of strong animal and perceptive powers, and so
able to send the Walworth shopkeepers into ecstasies.
His ganglions were big, as was the case in all great
preachers. Emotion, he said, was more a matter of
bowels than of brain. The ganglionic power carried

A PHRENOLOGICAL EVENING. 227

the brain \ but there were, of course, combinations of
all grades.

In the case of Henry Ward Beecher, two of whose
photographs he held in his hand, he dwelt on the disad-
vantage of having only the shadow instead of the sub-
stance of his head to deal with. Here, he said, we had
all the elements on a large scale. The brain, thoracic
system, osseous structure, and abdominal development
were ail in excess. The face was, as it were, the picture
of all. Henry Ward Beecher was emphatically a large
man. The blood was positive j the circulation good.
The digestion was perfect, and the man enjoyed good
food. Especially the length from the ear to the front
of the eyebrows denoted intellectual grasp. There was
not much will power. Whatever he had done (and Mr.
Burns emphatically disclaimed passing any judgment
on the " scandal ") he had not done of determination,
but had rather " slid into it." He was no planner.
He gathered people round him by the " solar " force of
his mind. If he had been a designing man — if largely
developed behind the ears — he would have gone to work
in a different way. There was good development in
the intellectual, sympathetic, and emotional part of
his nature ; and this combination made him a popular
preacher. There was more than mere animal magnet-
ism needed to account for this ; there was intellectual
power, but not much firmness or conscientiousness. If
he were present, he would probably acknowledge that
something had led him on to do whatever he had done
in spite of himself. What was very peculiar in the man
was his youthfulness. He had been before the world
for forty years. Mr. Fowler, the phrenologist, of Lud-
gate Circus, had been a fellow student of Beecher, and

2 28 MYSTIC LONDON.

had measured his head, which he ascertained to have
grown an inch in ten years. Beecher was essentially a
growing man — growing like a boy. The ganglionic
power was that which kept people always growing, and
was the great means of their getting a hold over other
people.

Mr. Burns then passed in review the three portraits
of Beecher, Tilton, and Mrs. Tilton respectively, in the
Pictorial World. Mrs. Tilton he described as a neg-
ative person, inclined to be hysterical and "clinging."
There was in her a high type of brain, morally, intellec-
tually, and spiritually. Still the brain, he said, did not
make us good or bad. Again repudiating all judgment
as to the scandal, he dwelt upon the close social rela-
tionships between Beecher and Mrs. Tilton, and re-
curred to the strong vital influence of the former, com-
paring it to that of Brigham Young upon his " spiritual
affinities." In all probability, taking into account the
different natures of Beecher and Mrs. Tilton, whatever
had occurred " the people couldn't help themselves."

Then as to Theodore Tilton. Mr. Burns had read
the Golden Age, and pronounced it a smart publication.
There was, however, in Tilton a want of ganglionic
power j he w^as all brain. He was a man who might
be read, but he could not lecture or preach. His was a
higher mind than Beecher's, but not one that would
command much human sympathy.

Suppose Mrs. Tilton were not the wife of either, her
relations to each might be conscientious, but still vio-
late the laws of monogamic life. The influence of
Beecher over her would be ganglionic as well as intel-
lectual ; that of Tilton purely intellectual : when lo, a
gust of ganglionic power would supervene on the lat-
ter, and carry all before it.

A PHRENOLOGICAL EVENING. 229

Concluding his analysis of Mr. Beecher thus, Mr.
Burns discovered that he had two clerics among his
audience, and asked us — for I was one of them — if we
would be examined. I readily consented, and handed
my notes to Miss Chandos (the young lady mesmerist,
whose seance I reported a few pages back) to report
progress. She, therefore, is responsible for the diagno-
sis that follows.

Handling me from head to foot, much as a fancier
does a prize ox at Smithfield, Mr. Burns found the life
power good, and the muscles well nourished, the work-
ing faculties being in a high state of activity. The
head — I blush to hear — measured one inch beyond the
average of a man of my size, and the cerebral faculties
were harmoniously organized. I had large perceptive
powers ; and my human nature (wherever that may be
located) was full, as was also firmness. The thinking
sphere was good. I should have made, Mr. Burns
informed me, a good sculptor or artist.

Omitting one or two complimentary remarks which
Miss Chandos has faithfully, if not flatteringly, reported,
and the enunciation of which quite confused me as I
sat the centre and cynosure of that wondering group, I
was glad to learn that I was an open man, though pos-
sessed of sufficient caution and not defective in moral
courage. In fact " pluck " was large. I really wished
Mr. Burns would relieve me by finding some bad bumps ;
but no — the worst he could say of me was that I was
restless. What chiefly seemed to strike him, though,
were my vital powers, and he really covered me with
confusion when he began to calculate my Beecher
powers on a possible Mrs. Tilton. However, he toned
down this remark by noticing that my domestic faculties

230 MYSTIC LONDON.

were well developed. My faith and hope were small
I was a "doubting" man. The positive and negative
were well blent in me, and I was also ''mediumistic.'"'

The diagnosis of two ladies concluded the evening's
exercises, but neither of these personages displayed any
very remarkable traits ; Mr. Burns declaring he felt
some difficulty in discovering the bumps under the
" back hair."

CHAPTER XXXVI.

A SPIRITUAL PICNIC.

TN a volume bearing the title of Mystic London it
would seem perchance that Spiritualism, as par
excellence the modern mystery, should stand first. I
have thought it better, however, to defer its treatment
somewhat, working up to it as to a climax, and then
gently descending to mundane matters once more ere I
close my present work.

Of London at this hour, just as of Rome in the later
Republic and Empire, it may be safely affirmed that
there is in its midst an element of the mysterious and
occult utterly undreamed of by the practical people.
Many phases of this element have already been treated
of in my different M^orks ; and I add some of the more
exceptional as properly belonging to my present subject.

Now I candidly confess that, up to a recent date, I
had not given Spiritualists — qua spiritualists — credit for
being a cheerful or convivial people. Though there
exist upon the tablets of my memory recollections of

A SPIRITUAL PICNIC.

231

certain enjoyable dinners, cosy teas, and cliarming petits
soupers., eaten at tlie mahogany of believers in the
modern mystery, yet these were purely exceptional
events, oases in the desert of spiritualistic experiences.
Generally speaking, the table, instead of groaning under
its accumulated bounties, leapt about as if from the
absence thereof ; and the only adjuncts of the inhospit-
able mahogany were paper tubes for the spirit voices,
handbells for the spirit hands, and occasional accordions
and musical boxes for the delectation of harmonious
ghosts. It was a " flow of soul " if not always a " feast
of reason ; " but, as regarded creature comforts, or any
of the ordinary delights of mundane existence, a very
Siberian desert. A grave subject of discussion (I am
not, I assure you, indulging in a sepulchral pun) at the
recent Liverpool Conference was how to feed mediums,
and I fancy the preponderating opinion was that fasting
was a cardinal virtue in their case — -a regimen that had
come to be in my mind, perhaps unfairly, associated with
sea?tces in general. I was glad, therefore when I read
in the columns of the Mediiifn the announcement of the
spiritual ' picnic or "demonstration," at the People's
Garden, Willesden. Still I wanted to see Spiritualists
enjoy themselves in the " normal condition." I sym-
pathized with the avowed object of .the gathering, that
the followers of the new creed should know one another,
as surely the disciples of a common school ought to do.
Armed, therefore, with a ticket, I proceeded, via the
North London Railway, to the scene of action. It was
not what we materialistic people should call a fine
August day. It was cold and dull, and tried hard to
rain ; but it was far more in keeping with the character
of the meetinor than what Father Newman calls the

232

MYSTIC LONDON.

"garish day " one looked for in mid- August. In the
words of the circle the " conditions were excellent ; "
and as I journeyed on, reading my Medmni like a true
believer, I marvelled to see, by the evidence of its
advertisements, how the new creed had taken hold of a
certain section, at all events, of society. Besides a
dozen public mediums who paraded their varied attrac-
tions at terms ranging from 2S, 6d. to 21s., there were
spiritualistic young men who put forward their creed as
a qualification for clerkships — perhaps they had no other
claim — spiritual lodging-house keepers, and even spirit-
ual undertakers, all pervaded by what we may literallj'
call a common esprit de corps.

In due course we reached the People's Garden, the
popular title whereof seemed to have been given on
the lucLis a no?i principle, for the London folk have not,
as yet, affected it largely. Why this should be so one
cannot guess, for it is the very ideal of a Cockney Para-
dise, and is admirably worked by a body of shareholders,
most of whom belonged to the artizan class, though
under very distinguished patronage indeed. When I
got to the grounds the Spiritualists were indulging in a
merry-go-round during a refreshing drizzle. A tempo-
rary rush under cover ensued, and then the weather be-
came more favorable, though the skies preserved their
neutral tint. Mrs. Bullock, a suburban medium, who
had become entranced, had located herself in a bower,
and beckoned people from the audience to receive her
"benediction," which was given in a remarkable dialect.
I- thought it was Yorkshire, but a spiritualistic gentleman
explained to me that it was '' partly North American
Indian." The Osborne Bellringers next gave a cam-
panological concert, which was exceedingly good of its

A SPIRITUAL PICNIC.

233

kind, the small gentleman who played the bass bell
working so actively as to suggest the idea that he could
not long sun^ive such hard labor in his fleshy condition.
These campanologists are said to be big mediums, and
occasionally to be floated or otherwise spirited during
their performances ; but nothing abnormal occurred at
the People's Garden. Then there was dancing on the
monster platform, which is, I should think, correctly
described as " the largest in the world." This was in-
deed a new phrase of Spiritualism : the terpsichorean
spiritualists generally let their tables do the dancing for
them, as Eastern potentates hire their dancing-girls.
Donkey-races, croquet, and other unspiritual diversions
varied the order of proceedings ; and as for the one-and-
ninepenny teas, I can only say I should think the Garden
Committee did not get much profit out of them, for the
Spiritualists regaled themselves in the most material
fashion. During the afternoon the arrivals were fast
and frequent. All the medium-power of London seemed
present ; and the only wonder was that we were not all
floated bodily away. There was Mrs. Gupp}^, who, in
answer to my demand whether she had been " floated "
from Highbury, informed me that she had come far less
romantically — " nine in a cab ! " There was Dr. Monk,
too, a Nonconformist clergyman, who had lately been
taking aerial journeys of the Guppy order about Bristol.
In fact the elite of the sect were well represented ; and
during the whole afternoon, despite the dirty-looking
day, the fun was fast and furious, and all went merry as
the proverbial marriage bell.

Part of the programme was an entertainment by a
gentleman bearing the delightfully sepulchral name of
Dr. Sexton, whose mission in life it is to " expose '" the

234 MYSTIC LONDON.

tricks of Dr. Lynn and Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke.
How those gentlemen are to be " exposed," seeing they
only claim to deceive you by legerdemain, I cannot com-
prehend ; but they make the Spiritualists very angry by
taking their names in vain on the handbills of the
Egyptian Hall, and more than insinuating that there was
a family liken"ess between their performances ; and, con-
sequently, the conjurors were to be " exposed ; " that is,
the public were to have their visit to the Temple of
Magic spoilt by being shown beforehand how the tricks
were done. Aided by an expert assistant named Organ,
Dr. Sexton soon let us into the mysteries of the cabinet
business, which seemed just as easy as making the t.g'g
stand on end — when you know how. It is perfectly
true that, after hearing Dr. Sexton's exposition — rather
than expose — it is quite easy for any one to frustrate the
designs of these clever conjurors, if he wishes to do so.
I am not sure that the expose is wise. Illogical people
will not see the force of Dr. Sexton's argument, and
will possibly think it " proves too much." If so much
can be done by sleight of hand and ingenious machin-
ery, they will argue, perhaps, that the Davenports and
other mediums are only cleverer conjurors still, or have
better machinery. Alas ! all my fairyland is pasteboard
now. I know how the man gets out of the corded box
— I could do it myself. I know where the gorilla goes
when he seems lost in the magic cabinet. It is all a
clever combination of mirrors. The blood-red letters of
some dear departed friend are only made with red ink
and a quill pen, and the name of the " dear departed "
forged. Well, I suppose I am illogical, too. If one set
of things is so simple when it is shown to you, why may
not all be ? I fear the Willesden outins: has unsettled

'&

A GHOSTLY CONFERENCE.

235

my convictions, and shaken my faith in most sublunary
things.

The gathering clearly proved the growth of Spiritual-
ism in London. That such numbers could be got to-
gether in the dead season bespeaks a very extensive
ramification indeed.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

A GHOSTLY CONFERENCE.

A DISTINCT and well-marked epoch is reached in
the history of any particular set of opinions when
its adherents begin to organize and confer, and the in-
dividual tenets become the doctrines of a party. Such
a culmination has been attained by the believers in
Modern Spiritualism. For a long while after the date
of the now historical Rochester Rappings, the manifes-
tations were mostly individual, and in a great degree
limited to such exercises as Mr. Home's elongation,
Mrs. Guppy's flight from Highbury to Lamb's Conduit
Street, or, more recently still, the voices and manipula-
tions of John and Katie King, the orations of Mrs.
Hardinge, Mr. Morse, and Mrs. Tappan. But all this
was spasmodic, and not likely to take the world by
storm, while Spiritualists had adopted the time-honored
maxim — " Magna est Veritas et prevalehity Therefore
they must organize. They have done so, not without
protest on the part of some of the most noted of their
adherents ; but the majority carried the day, and the re-

236 MYSTIC LONQON.-

suit is the British National Association of Spiritualists,
which has recently been sitting in solemn conclave at its
first Annual Conference in Lawson's Rooms, Gower
Street.

Now I plead guilty to being greatly interested in this
subject of Spiritualism generally, and in the doings of
the Conference in particular. I cannot help thinking
that clergymen and scientists ought to look into any set
of opinions whose professors have attained the dimen-
sions of this body. Their doctrines have spread and
are spreading. Already the Spiritualists number among
them such men as Mr. Alfred Wallace, Mr. Varley, Mr.
Crookes, Mr. S. C. Hall, etc., and are extending their
operations amongst all classes of society, notably among
the higher. I could even name clergymen . of all de-
nominations who hold Spiritualistic views, but refrain,
lest it should seem invidious, though I cannot see why
it should be incongruous for the clergy to examine doc-
trines which profess to amplify rather than supplant
those of revelation, any more than I can why scientists
stand aloof from what professes to be a purely positive
philosophy, based upon the inductive method. So it is,
however; Spiritualism is heterodox at once in its relig-
ious and philosophical aspects. I suppose that is why
it had such special atrraction for me. Certain it is, I
have been following the ghostly conference like a de-
votee.

We began on Monday evening with a musical soiree
at the Beethoven Rooms, in Harley Street ; and there
was certainly nothing ghostly or sepulchral in our open-
ing day ; only then there was nothing very spiritualistic
either. For a long time I thought it was going to be
all tea and muffins and pianoforte. By-and-by, however,

A GHOS TL Y CONFERENCE. 237

Mr. Algernon Joy read a report of the organization,
which was rather more interesting than reports gener-
ally are, and Mr. Benjamin Coleman, a venerable gen-
tleman, the father of London Spiritualists, delivered
a Presidential address. Still there were no ghosts —
not even a spirit rap to augment the applause which
followed the speakers. Once my hopes revived when
two new physical mediums, with letters of recommenda-
tion from Chicago, were introduced, and I expected to
see the young gentlemen elongate or float round the
room ; but nothing of the kind occurred ; and a young
lady dashed my hopes to the ground by singing "The
Nightingale's Trill." Mr. Morse gave an address iu
the trance state — as I was afterwards informed ; but he
looked and spoke so like an ordinary mortal that I
should not have found out that he was in an abnormal
condition.

I fear I went home from Harley Street not quite in
so harmonious a frame of mind as could have been
wished.

The next morning (Wednesday) Dr. Gully presided
at the opening of the Conference proper in Gower
Street, where the rooms were more like vaults and
smelt earthy. The President ably enough summarized
the objections which had been raised to the Associa-
tion, and also the objects it proposed to itself. He
said : — " If the Association keeps clear of dogmatic in-
trusion, then will there be no fear of its becoming sec-
tarian. Already, however, there is a signal of dogma-
tism among Spiritualists — and already the dogmatizers
call themselves by another name. But the Association
has nothing to do with this. It knows its function to
be the investigation of facts, and of facts only ; and, as

238 MYSTIC LONDON.

was said, no sect was ever yet framed on undoubted
facts. Now what are the facts of Spiritualism up to this
date? They are reducible to two : — ist. The continued
life and individuality of the spirit body of man after it
has quitted its body of flesh; and, 2d. Its communion
with spirits still in the flesh, under certain conditions,
by physical exhibition and mental impression. Spirit
identity cannot be regarded yet as an established fact —
at all events, not so as to warrant us in building upon
it."

I was agreeably surprised with the moderate tone of
this address ; and after a brief theological discussion,
Mr. W. H. Harrison, the editor of the Spi?-itualist^ fol-
lowed with a paper on Organization. I do not know
that Mr. Harrison was not for organizing. Libraries,
reading-rooms, colleges, everything was to be spiritual-
ized. Later in the day there was a paper on Physical
Manifestations. I should have preferred the manifes-
tations v/ithout the paper, for I fear I am a poor be-
liever at secondhand. The reader told some "stump-
ing ' stories. Here is one as a specimen — spiritual in .,,,
more senses than one : — ■ 'H

" One evening I accompanied the Davenports to
Mr. Guppy's residence in Great Marlborough Street.
After supper, Ira, the eldest of the brothers, Mr. Gup-
py, and myself, adjourned to a dark room, which Mr.
Guppy had had prepared for experimental purposes. To
get to this room we;,^ had to pass through a room that
served the combined purposes of a sculptor's studio
and a billiard room. Emerging from this room we
came into a yard, in one corner of which the dark cab-
inet in question was constructed. Taking our seats, we
extinguished the light. Mr. Guppy was at the time

A GHOSTLY CONFERENCE. 239

smoking a cigar. This was at once taken from his
hand, and carried in the air, where it could be seen by
the light given out by its combustion. Some whisky
and water was standing on the table. This was handed
to us to drink. When it came to my turn, I found there
was but little left in the glass. This I pointed out.
The glass was forthwith taken from my mouth, and re-
plenished and brought back again."

On Thursday Mr. Everitt read a paper on Direct
Writing by Spirits, telling us that on one occasion nine
hundred and thirty-six words were written in six sec-
onds. Mr. Everitt must be a bold man — I don't mean
altogether for asking us to believe that, but for saying
what he did about the medium, who was his wife : —
" There are many considerations why it would be im-
possible for the medium to have produced these writ-
ings. For instance, we have sixteen papers upon the
same subject, and in those papers there are a great
many ancient authors referred to. Mrs. Everitt has
never read nor seen a single book of any of these au-
thors, and, with a few exceptions, their names had never
been heard "by her before, much less did she know the
age they lived in, the country they belonged to, the
works they had written, or the arguments made use of
for the defence of their doctrines and teachings. Be-
sides the above reasons there are physical and mental
difficulties which preclude the possibility of their being
produced by the medium. The physical impossibility
is the marvellous rapidity of their production, as many
as 936 words having been written in six seconds. The
mental difficulty is that the medium has not a logical mind.
Like most females, she takes a shortcut by jumping to
conclusions. She does not, indeed cannot, argue out

240 MYSTIC LONDON.

any proposition by the ordinary rules of logic. Now the
papers referred to show that the author or authors are
not only well acquainted with ancient lore and the clas-
sics, but also possessed very high ability as logicians.
For the above reasons we conclude that the medium,
from sheer incapacity, both mentally and physically,
could not have written these papers, nor any other
human being under the same circumstances. We are
therefore absolutely driven, after looking at the subject
from every conceivable point of view, to conclude re-
specting their production that they came from a super-
natural source, and were produced by supernatural
means."

In the afternoon of this day a clergyman, whose name
it would be highly indecorous in me to mention, descant-
ed on the aspect of Spiritualism from his point of view
in the Church of England. I understood the purport of
the paper to be (i) that he claimed the right of members
of the Church of England to investigate the phenomena ;
(2) that, if convinced of their spiritual origin, such con-
viction need not shake the investigator's previous faith.
If the clergyman in question really said no more than
the printed reports of the Conference represent him to
have done, he rather reversed the conduct of Balaam,
and cursed those he came to bless. This is the curt
rhum'e that went forth : —

" The Rev. read a paper, in v/hich he defined his

position with regard to Spiritualism as that of a mere
inquirer, adding that even if he became convinced of
its truth, he saw no reason why he should alter the
opinions he at present held as a clergyman of the Church
of England. After eighteen months' inquiry into the
subject, however, he was, perhaps^ more of a skeptic than

A GHOSTLYXONFERENCE. 241

before/' If that was all the clergyman in question had
to say for the Association, they must rather regret they
ever " organized " him, and might well pray to be saved
from their friends ; but I heard it whispered — presumably
by a spirit voice — that there had been a passage at arms
between the lady secretary and the clerg}anan in ques-
tion, and that Miss — but no, I must not mention names
— the fair official punished the delinquent with that most
awful penalty — silence.

Friday finished the Conference with a trance paper —
I did not know there were such things — dictated to Mrs.
Cora Tappan by invisible guides, and was read by Miss
— I mean by the fair incognita above-mentioned. Not
a manifestation — literally not the ghost of one — only
this very glowing peroration : — " But it is in a larger
sense of social, mental, political, and even religious ren-
ovation, that Spiritualism is destined to work its chief
results. The abrogation of the primal terror of man-
kind, the most ancient spectre in the world of thought,
grim and shadowy Death, is, in itself, so vital a change
that it constitutes a revolution in the world of mind.
Chemistry has already revealed the wonderful fact that
no ultimate atom can perish. The subtle chemistry of
Spiritualism steps in where science ceases, gathering up
the ultimate atoms of though^nto a spiritual entity and
proving them imperishable. Already has this thought
pervaded the popular mind, tinged the decaying forms
of theology and external science with its glow, and made
the life of man a heritage of immortal glory. More
than this, taking spirit as the primal basis of life, each
individual, and all members of society and humanity in
the aggregate, must for ever strive to express its highest
life {i.e. the life of the spirit.) The child will be taught

16

242 MYSTIC LONDON.

from within, external methods being employed only as
aids, but never as dictators of thought. Society will be
the flowing out of spiritual truths, taking shape and sub-
stance as the expression of the soul. Governments will
be the protecting power of a parent over loving children,
instead of the dictates of force or tyranny. Religion
will wear its native garb of simplicity and truth, the off-
spring of the love and faith that gave it birth. Modern
Spiritualism is as great a solvent of creeds, dogmas,
codes, scientific sophisms, as is the sunlight of the sub-
stances contained in earth and air, revealing by the
stages of intermediate life, from man, through spirits,
angels, archangels, seraphim, and cherubim, to God,
the glorious destiny of every soul. There is a vine
growing in the islands of the tropic seas that thrives best
upon the ancient ruins or crumbling walls of some edifice
built by man j yet ever as it thrives, the tiny tendrils
penetrate between the fibres of the stone, cutting and
cutting till the whole fabric disappears, leaving only the
verdant mass of the foliage of the living vine. Spirit-
ualism is to the future humanity what this vine is to the
ancient ruin."

There was another paper coming on " Compound
Consciousness," but the tkle did not attract me. After
my four days' patient waiting for ghosts who never came
and spirits that would not manifest, I felt, perhaps, a
little impatient, put on my hat and left abruptly — the
fair secretary, of whom I shall evermore stand in supreme
awe, scowling at me when I did so. As I passed into
Gower Street — sweet, serene Gower Street, sacred from
the wheels of profane cabmen, I was almost surprised to
see the " Materialized " forms around me ; and it really
was not until I got well within sound — and smell — of

AN E VENINCrS DIABLERIE. 2 4

the Underground Railway that I quite reahzed my
abased position, or got out of the spheres whither the
lofty periods of Mrs. Tappan's paper, so mellifiuously
delivered, had wafted me !

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

AN evening's diablerie.

TV /TR. Spurgeon, a short time since oracularly placed
^ ^ it on record that, having hitherto deemed Spirit-
ualism humbug, he now believes it to be the devil. This
sudden conversion is, of course, final ; and I proceed to
narrate a somewhat exceptional endorsement of the
opinion which has recently occurred within my own ex-
perience. There was a time, how long ago it boots
not to say, when /considered Spiritualism humbug; and
a good deal came in my way which might have led me
to the same conclusion as Mr. Spurgeon, if I had been
disposed — which I am not — to go with a hop, skip, and
jump.

The investigator who first presented the " diabolical"
theory to my notice was a French Roman Catholic
priest, who had broken discipline so far as to enter the
married state, but retained all the doctrines of his former
faith intact. He had, in fact, anticipated to some extent
the position of Pere Hyacinthe ; for it was several years
ago I first became acquainted with him. Individually
as well as nationally this gentleman, too, was prone to
jump at conclusions. He lost a dear friend, and im-

244 MYSTIC LONDON.

mediately proceeded to communicate with the departed
by means of table-turning and rapping. For a few days
he was quite convinced of the identity, of the communi-
cating spirit ; but then, and all within the compass of a
single week, he pronounced the exorcism of the Catholic
Church on the intelligence, I suppose experimentally in
the first instance j found his challenge not satisfactorily
answered, and immediately jumped to the conclusion
that it was the foul fiend himself. I sat very frequently
with this gentleman afterwards, prior to the experience
I am about to narrate ; and certainly the intelligence
always gave itself out to be the spirit-unmentionable to
ears polite, whose presence my friend Iiad taken for
granted.

I once went with this gentleman to the Marshalls,
when they were at their zenith. We arranged previously
that he should not sit at the table, but on one side, and
give me a secret signal when he was silently pronounc-
ing the exorcism. He did so ; and certainly all mani-
festations at once ceased, though we had been in full
converse with the invisibles a moment before. Old
Mrs. M. had to announce with much chagrin, " The
sperrits is gone ! "

My other partner in diablerie was a barrister whom I
must not mention by name, but who possessed con-
siderable power as a writing medium. The presiding
intelligence in his case was, however, of a low character,
and given to very bad language. He avowed himself
to have been a bargee in the earth-plane — should one
say the water-plane 1 — and certainly swore like one.

As for myself, I am destitute of all " medium-power,'*
whatever that may be, though enthusiastic spirituelle
ladies tell me I am " mediumistic " — a qualification

AN EVENING'S DIABLERIE.

245

which is still more occult to me. I own to be greatly
interested in spiritualistic inquiries, except as regards
dark seafices, which have a tendency to send me to
sleep ; and I believe that my presence does not " stop
manifestations ; " so that I suppose I am not a hopeless
skeptic.

On the occasion of which I am about to speak we met
in my study, where I am in the habit of rearing a few
pet snakes. I had just got a fine new specimen ;
and having no proper habitation for it, had turned my
waste-basket upside-down on a small chess table, and left
him to tabernacle under it for the night. This was the table
we generally used for seances ; and my legal friend, who
was writing, immediately began to use most foul lan-
guage, on the subject of the snake, exhorting me to
" put him anywhere, put him in the cupboard, old boy."
Such was the edifying style of communication we always
got through this worthy limb of the law, but it was
so much worse than usual on the present occasion as to
fairly make us roar at its insane abuse. The gentleman
himself, I ought to add, is by no means prone to profane
swearing. - My priestly friend was making a wide-
awake hat reply by tilts ; and still got his old reply that
his Satanic Majesty was personally present. I did not
in the least credit this assertion, any more than I
accepted as proven the identity of the bargee, though I
hold the impersonation in either cases to be a strange
psychological fact. That I did not do so is best evidenced
by the circumstance that I said, "This spirit asserts
himself to be his Satanic Majesty. Have you either of
you any objection to communicate with him supposing
such to be the case ? "

Neither one or the other had the slightest. My

2^6 MYSTIC LONDON.

Catholic friend, I knew, always carried a bottle of lioly
water in his pocket, and at my entreaty forbore for the
moment to exorcise. The legal gentleman, though a
^'writer" himself, was not at all convinced about the
phenomena, as was perhaps natural, seeing the exceed-
ingly bad company to which it professed to relegate him.
As for me, my skepticism was to me robur et ess triplex,
I disposed of the snake, put out the gas ; and down we
three sat, amid profound darkness, like three male
witches in " Macbeth," having previously locked the
door to prevent any one disturbing our hocus-pocus.

Any one who has sat at an ordinary dark seance will
recollect the number of false starts the table makes, the
exclamations, " Was that a rap ? " when the wood
simply cracks, or, " Did you feel a cold air .? " when
somebody breathes a little more heavily than usual. I
have myself made the experiment, though not without
adding an open confession immediately afterwards. I
have blown on the fingers of the sitters, and made them
feel sure it was a sph^it aura., have done the neatest
of raps with my index-finger when my little finger has
been securely hooked in that of my next neighbor. In
fact, for test purposes, dark seances are a mistake,
though they are admirable for a flirtation.

On this occasion, however, we were very much in earn-
est, and there was no waiting — I hope no collusion. I am
quite sure I did not myself consciously produce any
manifestation. I can answer for my legal friend, as far
as any one person can answer for another ; and we neither
of us suspected — or suspect — the priest of the order of St.
Benedict ; only we would rather he had not pronounced
such decided opinions ; because the wish might have
been father to the thought, or rather the thought might, in

I

AN EVENINGS DIABLERIE.

247

some utterly unaccountable way, have produced the
effects that followed. I have an idea that if Mr. Spur-
geon in his present frame of mind were to sit at a table
for manifestations, he would obtain the clearest assur-
ance that it was " all the devil," just as it is well known
Roman Catholic sitters get communications from Roman
Catholic spirits, theists from theistic, and Mormons from
the denizens of some spiritualistic Utah.

We had not, on this occasion, a moment to wait. The
table forthwith began to plunge and career about the
room as though the bargee — or the other personage
himself — had actually been " in possession." It required
all our agility to follow it in its rapid motion about the
room. At last it became comparatively quiet ; and I
received in reply to a question as to who was present the
exceedingly objectional name which Mr. Spurgeon has
coupled with the whole subject. Some persons I know
entertain a certain amount of respect, or at all events
awe, for the intelligence in question. For myself I feel
nothing of the kind, and therefore I added, " If you are
what you profess to be, give us some proof." We were
sitting with only the tips of our fingers on the table ; but it
forthwith rose up quite perpendicularly, and came down
with a crash that completely shivered it in pieces. I
have not the slightest idea how it was done — but it cer-
tainly was don^. A large portion of the table was
reduced to a condition that fitted it for Messrs. Bryant
and May's manufactory. When we lighted the gas and
looked at our watches we found we had only been sitting
a very few minutes.

Of course the obvious explanation will be that the
gentleman with the diabolical theory and the evidently
strong will-power (as evidenced in the denouement at Mrs

248 MYSTIC LONDON.

Marshall's) produced the diabolical effects consciously
or unconsciously. I do not think the former was the
case ; and. if it is possible to get such results uncon-
sciously, that phenomenbn is quite as curious as the
spiritualistic explanation. In fact I am not sure that
the psychological is not more difficult than the pneu-
matological theory. My own notion is that the " Psy-
chic Force " people are clearly on the right track,
though their cause, as at present elaborated, is not yet
equal to cover all the effects.

Mr. Spurgeon and the " diabolists " concede the
whole of the spiritualistic position. They not only say
that the effects are due to spiritual causes, but they also
identify the producing spirit. I have never been able
to get as far as that. I did not feel on the occasion in
question at all as though I had been in communication
with his sable Majesty. If I was, certainly my respect
for that potentate is not increased, for I should have
fancied he would have done something much "bigger"
in reply to my challenge than smash up a small chess-
table. However, there was a sort of uncanny feeling
about the experience, and it seemed to me so far illus-
trative of Mr. Spurgeon's position as to be worth com-
mitting to paper. If that gentleman, however, lends
such a doctrine the sanction of his approval, he will, let
him be assured, do more to confirm the' claims of Spirit-
ualism than all the sneers of Professors Huxley and
Tyndall, and the scorn of Mr. George Henry Lewis can
undo.

I

SPIRITUAL ATHLETES. 249

CHAPTER XXXIX.

SPIRITUAL ATHLETES.

T AM about for once to depart from my usual custom
■^ of narrating only personal experiences, and in this
and the two following chapters print the communications
of a friend who shares my interest in these matters, and
has frequently accompanied me in my investigations
into this mysterious Borderland. In these cases, how-
ever, he investigated on his own account, and I am not
responsible for the conclusions at which he arrives :

" Attracted," he says, " by an article in a popular
journal on the subject of ' Spirit Faces,' I determined,
if possible, to ' assist ' at a seance. I had not hitherto
taken much interest in spiritualistic matters, because in
the first place, the cui bojio question remained persist-
ently unanswered ; and, secondly, because most of the
' doings ' were in the dark \ and it appears to me that,
given darkness, there are few things in the way of con-
juring and ventriloquism that could not be done. Terp-
sichorean tables and talking hats never had any par-
ticular charm for me, because I could always make a
table dance, or a hat say anything I wanted it to say.
I saw the Davenports, and preferred Professor Ander-
son. I even went to a dark seance at the Marshalls',
and noticed that when Mr. and Mrs. Marshall had per-
ceptibly partaken of beefsteak and onions, or some
equally fragrant food, for dinner, the breath which ac-
companied the spirit-voices was unmistakably impreg-

2^0 MYSTIC LONDON.

nated with onions too \ and hence I drew my own con-
clusions. I am not saying I know how Mr. and Mrs.
Marshall do John King and Katie King. I don't know
how Professor Anderson or Professor Pepper do their
tricks. I confess Mr. Home and the Marshalls have
the pull of the professors in one way — that is, they don't
perform on a platform but in a private room, and they
let you examine everything beforehand. Theirs is the
ars celare artem. Again, I don't know how men in the
street get out of the very curious knots in which I have
tied them, but I know they do it ; and therefore I am
sure the Davenports could do it without calling in the
ghost of one's deceased grandmamma as a sort of Dens
— or rather Dea — ex machina. I have never seen Mr.
Home handle fire or elongate. I have seen him ' levi-
tate,' or float, and I candidly confess I don't know how
he does it, any more than I can solve Sir David Brews-
ter's trick by which four young ladies can lift a heavy
man on the points of their fingers. It's very mysterious,
and very nice for the man.

" So it happened that I had shelved spiritualism for
some time, when the article on ' Spirit Faces ' came
under my notice. I did not care so much about the
[ace part of the matter (at least not the spirit face), but
I wanted to test it as a matter of athletics. In one re-
spect the physiognomy did interest me, for I read that
the medium was pretty — mediums, according to my ex-
perience, being generally very much the reverse — and I
found that report had certainly not misrepresented the
young lady in this respect. Her name is now public
property, so I need not veil it under the pseudonyms of
Miss Blank, or Asterisk, or anything of that sort. Miss
Florence Cook, then, is a trim little lady of sweet six-

SPIRITUAL ATHLEl'ES. 251

teen, and dwells beneath the paternal roof in an eastern
suburb ot London. It is quite true she does not accept
payment for seaiiccs, which I strove to impress upon
her was very foolish indeed, for she works almost as
hard as Lulu twice in the week. However, she, or rath-
er her parents, take high ground in the matter, which of
course is very praiseworthy on their parts, and conven-
ient for their guests if they happen to be impecunious,

" Now, I do not purpose going through the details of
the seance^ which was considerably irksome, being pro-
tracted by endless psalm singing. What I want to do
— ^with Miss Cook's permission — is to calculate the
chances of her being sufficiently athletic to perform the
tricks herself, without the aid of spirits. Does she not
underrate her unaided powers in assigning a super-
natural cause for the effects produced ?

" Well, then, this lithe little lady is arrayed in the
ordinary garb of the nineteenth century with what is
technically termed a " pannier," and large open sleeves,
each of which, I fear, she must have found considerably
in the way, as also the sundry lockets and other nick-
nacks suspended from her neck. However, there they
were. We put her in a cupboard, which had a single
Windsor chair in it, and laid a stoutish new cord on her
lap. Then came singing, which may or may not have
been intended to drown any noise in the cupboard ; but,
after some delay, she was found tied around the waist,
neck, and two wrists, and the ends of the cord fastened
to the back of the chair. These knots we sealed, and
consigned her to the cupboard again. Shortly after
there appeared at an aperture in the upper portion of
the cupboard a face which looked utterly unspiritual and
precisely like that of the medium, only with some white

252 MYSTIC L OND ON.

drapery thrown over the head. The aperture was just
the height that would have allowed Miss Cook to stand
on the chair and peep out. I do not say she did ; I am
only calculating the height. The face remained some
minutes in a strong light ; then descended. We opened
the cupboard, and found the little lady tied as before
with the seals unbroken. Spiritual, or material, it was
clever.

"After a pause, the same process was gone through
again ; only this time stout tape was substituted for rope.
The cord cut the girl's wrists ; and tape was almost
more satisfactory. Again she was bound, and we sealed
the knots ; and again a face appeared — this time quite
black, and not like the medium at all. I noticed that
the drapery ran right round the face, and cut it oif at a
straight line on the lower part. This gave the idea of a
mask. I am not saying it was a mask. I am only
throwing out a hint that, if the ' spirits ' wish to con-
vince people they should let the neck be well seen. I
am bound to say it bore a strong light for several min-
utes ; and some people say they saw eyelids. I did
not. I do not say they were not there. I know how
impossible it is to prove a negative, and only say I did
not see them.

" What followed possessed no special interest for any
but the professed spiritualist, as it was done without any
tying ; Miss Cook arguing logically enough that, if the
previous manifestations were clearly proved to have
taken place by other agency than that of the medium
herself, mere multiplication of proofs was unnecessary.
I had only gone to study the matter from an athletic
point of view; and I certainly came away impressed
with the idea that, if Miss Florence Cook first got into

SPIRITUAL ATHLETES.

253

and then got out of those knots, she was even more
nhnble and lithesome than she looked, and ought to
start an Amateur Ladies' Athletic Society forthwith. As
to her making faces at us through the window, I did not
care sufficiently about the matter to inquire whether she
did or not, because, if she got out of the 'ropes, it was
easy enough to get on the chair and make faces.

"Of course the cui bono remains. The professors
make money by it ; and Miss Cook can make at most,
only a little mild and scarcely enviable notoriety. A
satirical old friend of mine, when I told him the above
facts, chuckled, and said, ' That's quite enough for a
girl of sixteen ; and anything that's do-able, a girl of
those years will do.' It was no use talking to him of
panniers and loose sleeves, and lockets. He was an
old bachelor, and knew nothing about such things. At
least, he had no business to, if he did.

" I cannot forbear adding a domestic episode, though
it is perhaps scarcely relevant to the subject. Certain
young imps in my house, hearing what I had seen, got
up an exhibition of spirit faces for my benefit. They
rigged up a kind of Punch-and-Judy erection, and the
cleanest of them did the spirit face, with a white pocket-
handkerchief over his head. He looked as stolid and
unwinking as the genuine spirit-physiognomy itself.
The gas was lowered to a 'dim religious light,' and then
a black coal-scuttle, with features v^halked on it, de-
ceived some of the circle into the idea that it was a
nisfi^er. But the one element which interested me was
wanting ; there was no rope-tying which could at all
entitle the juvenile performance to be categorized under
'Spiritual Athletics.'"

254

MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTEPv XL.

^'spotting" spirit mediums.

** A MONG the recent utterances of spiritualistic
"^^ organs is one to the effect that ' manifestations '
come in cycles — in ' great waves,' I believe was the
actual expression ; and of the many fluctuations to
which spiritualistic society has been exposed of late is
a very prominent irruption of young lady mediums.
The time seems to have gone by for portly matrons to
be wafted aerially from the northern suburbs to the
W. C. district, or elderly spinsters to exhibit spirit
drawings v/hich gave one the idea of a water-color
palette having been overturned, and the resulting ' mess '
sat upon for the purpose of concealment. Even inspira-
tional speakers have so far 'gone out' as to subside
from aristocratic halls to decidedly second-rate institu-
tions down back streets. In fact, the 'wave' that has
come over the spirit world seems to resemble that which
has also supervened upon the purely mundane arrange-
ments of Messrs. Spiers and Pond; and we anxious
investigators can scarcely complain of the change which
brings us face to face with fair young maidens in their
teens, to the exclusion of the matrons and spinsters
aforesaid, or the male medium who was once irreverently
termed by a narrator a ' bull-necked young man.'

"The names of these interesting young denizens of
two worlds are so well known that it is perhaps unneces-
sary caution or superfluous gallantry to conceal them j

" SPO TTING " SPIRIT MEDIUMS. 255

but I will err, if error it be, on the safe side, and call
No. I Miss C. and No. 2 Miss S., premising only that
each is decidedly attractive, with the unquestioned
advantage of having seen only some sixteen or seventeen
summers apiece. Miss C. has been 'out' some time ;
her familiar being * Katie King;' while Miss S. has
made her debut more recently, having for her attendant
sprites one ' Florence Maple,' a young lady spirit who
has given a wrong terrestrial address in Aberdeen, and
Peter, a defunct market gardener, who sings through
the young lady's organism in a clear baritone voice. It
was to me personally a source of great satisfaction when
I learnt that Miss C. had been taken in hand by a
F. R. S. — whom I will call henceforth the Professor —
and Miss S. by a Sergeant learned in the law. Now, if
ever, I thought, we have a chance of hearing what
science and evidential acumen have to say on the sub-
ject of ' Face Manifestations.' Each of these gentlemen,
I ought to mention, had written voluminously on the
subject of Spiritualism, and both seemed inclined to
contest its claims in favor of some occult physical — or,
as they named it, psychic — force. This would make
their verdict the more valuable lo outsiders, as it was
clear they had not approached the subject with a fore-
gone conclusion in its favor. True, the Spiritualists
claimed both the Professor and the Sergeant persistently
as their own ; but Spiritualists have a way of thinking
everybody ' converted ' who simply sits still in a deco-
rous manner, and keeps his eyes open without loudly
proclaiming skepticism.

" Personally I had been, up to the date of present
occurrences, accustomed to summarize my convictions
on the subject by the conveniently elastic formula that

356 MYSTIC LONDON. '

there might be ' something in it.' I still think so ; but
perhaps with a difference.

" For the former of the two exposes — if such they
shall be deemed — I am compelled to rely on documen-
tary evidence ; but I have ' sat ' so many times with
Miss S., have been requested so often by the inspira-
tional Peter to ' listen to the whip-poor-will, a-singin' on
the tree,' have shaken the spirit hand, gazed on the
spirit face, and even cut off portions of the spirit veil of
the fair Florence, that I can follow the order of events
just as though I had been present, I must confess this
wonderful similarity existing between Miss S. and Flor-
ence had exercised me considerably, and perhaps pre-
pared me to accept with calmness what followed. Why
delay the result ? Miss S. and her mamma were invited
to the country house of the learned Serjeant. A ' cabi-
net ' was extemporized in the bay of the window, over
which the curtains were drawn and a shawl pinned.
With a confidence which is really charming to contem-
plate, no ' tests ' were asked of the medium, no ' condi-
tions ' imposed on the sitter. Miss S. was put in the
cabinet with only a chair, and the expectant circle waited
with patience. In due time the curtains were drawn
aside, and the spirit-face appeared at the opening. It
was still iho. facsimile of Miss S., with the eyes piously
turned up, and a ghostly head-dress covering the hair.
One by one the assembled were summoned to look more
closely. The initiated gazed and passed on, knowing
they must not peep ; but, alas, one lady who w^as noi
initiated, and therefore unaware of the tacitly imposed
conditions, imitated the example of Mother Eve, drew
aside the curtains, and exposed the unspiritual form of
Miss S. standing on the chair; the 'spirit-hands' at

" SPO TTING " SPIRIT MEDIUMS. 257

the same time struggling so convulsively to close the
aperture that the head-gear fell off, and betrayed the
somewhat voluminous chignon of Miss S. herself.
Hereupon ensued a row, it being declared that the
medium was killed, though eventually order was re-
stored by the rather incongruous process of a gentleman
present singing a comic song. The learned Serjeant still
clings to the belief that Miss S. was in a condition of
* unconscious somnambulism.' I only hope, if ever I am
arraigned before him in his judicial capacity, he will ex-
tend his benevolent credulity to me in an equal degree,
and give me the benefit of the doubt.

" It may be in the recollection of those who follow
the fluctuations of the Spiritual ' wave ' that some
months ago a dialectical gentleman seized rudely on
the spirit-form of Katie, which struggled violently with
him, scratching his face and pulling out his whiskers,
eventually making good its retreat into the cupboard,
where Miss C. was presumably bound hand and foot.
I must confess the fact of that escape rather prejudiced
me in favor of Katie, though I would rather she had
evaporated into thin air, and left the dialectical whiskers
intact. Still it scored a point on Katie's side, and I
eagerly availed myself of the opportunity to pay my
devoirs at the shrine of Miss C. ; the more so as
the Professor had asserted twice that he had seen and
handled the form of the medium while looking on and
conversing with that of the spirit at the same time.
If I could retain my former faith in the Professor, of
course this would be final, and my conversion an ac-
comphshed fact.

" We sat no longer in the subterranean breakfast-
room of Miss C.'s parental abode ; but moved up to

17

258 MYSTIC LONDON.

the parlor floor, where two rooms communicated through
folding doors, the front apartment being that in which
we assembled, and the back used as a bed-room, where
the ladies took off their ' things.' This latter room, be
it remembered, had a second room communicating with
the passage, and so with the universe of space in gen-
eral. One leaf of the folding doors was closed, and a
curtain hung over the other. Pillows were placed on
the floor, just inside the curtain, and the little medium,
who was nattily arrayed in a blue dress, was laid upon
them. We were requested to sing and talk during
' materialization,' and there was as much putting up
and lowering of the light as in a modern sensation
drama. The Professor acted all the time as Master of
the Ceremonies, retaining his place at the aperture; and
I fear, from the very first, exciting suspicion by his
marked attention, not to the medium, but to the ghost.
When it did come, it was arrayed according to orthodox
ghost fashion, in loose white garments, and I must con-
fess with no resemblance to Miss C. We were at the
same time shown the recumbent form of the pillowed
medium, and there certainly was something blue, which
might have been Miss C, or only her gown going to the
wash. By-and-bye, however, with ' lights down,' a
bottle of phosphorized oil was produced, and by this
weird and uncanny radiance one or two privileged
individuals were led by the ' ghost ' into the back bed-
room, and allowed to put their hands on the entranced
form of the medium. I was not of the ' elect/ but I
talked to those who were, and their opinion was that
the ' gliost ' was a much stouter, bigger woman than
the medium ; and I must confess that certain unhal-
lowed ideas of the bedroom door and the adjacent

*' SPO TTING " SPIRIT MEDIUMS. 259

kitchen stairs connected themselves in my mind with
recollections of a brawny servant girl who used to sit
sentry over the cupboard in the breakfast-room. Where
was she ?

"As a final ho7i?ie bouche^ the spirit made its exit from
the side of the folding dopr covered by the curtain, and
immediately Miss C rose up with dishevelled locks
in a way that must have been satisfactory to anybody
who knew nothing of the back door and the brawny
servant, or who had never seen the late Mr. Charles
Kean act in the ' Corsican Brothers,' or the ' Courier of
Lyons.'

" I am free to confess the final death-blow to my belief
that there might be ' something in ' the Face Manifes-
tations was given by the effusive I'rofessor, who has
* gone in ' for the Double with a pertinacity altogether
opposed to the calm judicial examination of his brother
learned in the law, and with prejudice scarcely becom-
ing a F. R. S.

" I am quite aware that all this proves nothing.
Miss S. and Miss C. may each justify Longfellow's
adjuration—"

" Trust her not, she is fooling thee ; "

and yet ghosts be as genuine as guano. Only I fancy
the ' wave ' of young ladies will have to ebb for a little
while ; and I am exceedingly interested in speculating as
to what will be the next ' cycle.' From ' information I
have received,' emanating from Brighton, I am strongly
of opinion that babies are looking up in the ghost mar-
ket, and that our next manifestations may come through
an infant phenomenon."

2 6o MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER XLI.

A SEANCE FOR SKEPTICS.

^^ ATTRACTED by the prominence recently given
^^^ to the subject of Spiritualism in the Times,
and undeterred by that journal's subsequent recanta-
tion, or the inevitable scorn of the Saturday Review,
I determined to test for myself the value of the testi-
mony so copiously quoted by believers in the modern
marvel. Clearly if certain published letters of the
period were to be put in evidence, Spiritualism had very
much the better, and Science exceedingly little to say
for itself. But we all know that this is a subject on
which scientific men are apt to be reticent. ' Tacere
tutum est^ seems the Fabian policy adopted by those
who find this new Hannibal suddenly come from
across sea into their midst. It is moreover a subject
about which the public will not be convinced by any
amount of writing or talking, but simply by what it can
see and handle for itself. It may be of service, then, if
I put on record the result of an examination made below
the surface of this matter.

"Like most other miracles this particular one evi-
dently has its phases and comes about in cycles. For
a generation past, or nearly so, Modern Spiritualism
has been so far allied with table-turning and mysterious
rappings as to have appropriated to itself in conse-
quence certain ludicrous titles, against which it vainly
protests. Then cropped up ' levitations ' and ' elonga-

A scejye fok skeptics. 261

tions ' of the person, and Mr. Home delighted to put
red-hot coals on the heads of his friends. None of
these manifestations, however, were sufficient to make
the spiritualistic theory any other than a huge petitio
pf-incipii. The Davenports were the first to inaugurate
on anything like an extended scale the alleged appear-
ance of the human body, or rather 6f certain members
of the human body, principally arms and hands, through
the peep-hole of their cabinet. Then came ' spirit-
voices ' with Mrs. Marshall, and aerial transits on the
part of Mrs. Guppy j then the 'entire form of the de-
parted ' was said to be visible chez Messrs. Heme and
Williams in Lamb's Conduit Street, whose abode
formed Mrs. Guppy's terminus on the occasion of her
nocturnal voyage. Then came Miss Florence Cook's
spirit-faces at Hackney, which were produced under a
strong light, which submitted to be touched and tested
in what seemed a very complete manner, and even held
conversations with persons in the circle. Finally, I
heard it whispered that these faces were being recog-
nized on a somewhat extended scale at the seances of
Mrs. Holmes, in Old Quebec Street, where certain
other marvels were also to be witnessed, which decided
me on paying that lady a visit.

" Even these, however, were not the principal attrac-
tions which drew me to the tripod of the seeress in Que-
bec Street. It had been continually urged as an argument
against the claims of Modern Spiritualism, first, that it
shunned the light and clave to ' dark ' circles ; second-
1}', that it was over sensitive on the subject of 'skep-
tics.' Surely, we are all skeptics in the sense of inves-
tigators. The most pretentious disciple of Spiritualism
does not claim to have exhausted the subject. On the

262 MYSTIC LONDON-.

contrary, they all tell us we are now only learning the
alphabet of the craft. Perhaps the recognized Spirit-
faces may have landed us in words of one syllable, but
scarcely more. However, the great advantage which
Mrs. Holmes possessed in my eyes over all the pro-
fessors of the new art was that she did not object to
skeptics. Accordingly to Quebec Street I went, for the
distinct purpose of testing the question of recognition.
If I myself, or any person on whose testimony I could
rely, established a single case of undoubted recognition,
that, I felt, would go farther than anything else towards
solving the spiritualistic problem.

" I devoted two Monday evenings to this business ;
that being the day on which Mrs. Holmes, as she
phrases it, 'sits for faces.' On the former of the two
occasions twenty-seven persons assembled, and the first
portion of the evening was devoted to the Dark
Seance^ which presented some novel features in itself,
but was not the special object for which I was present.
Mrs. Holmes, who is a self-possessed American lady,
evidently equal to tackling any number of skeptics, was
securely tied in a chair. All the circle joined hands ;
and certainly, as soon as the light was out, fiddles,
guitars, tambourines and bells did fly about the room
in a very unaccountable manner, and when the candle
was lighted, I found a fiddle-bow down my back, a gui-
tar on my lap, and a tambourine ring round my neck.
But there was nothing spiritual in this, and the voice
which addressed us familiarly during the operation may
or may not have been a spirit voice.

" Mrs. Holmes having been released from some very
perplexing knots, avowedly by spirit power, proceeded
to what is called the ' Ring Test,' and I was honored

A SCENE FOR SKEPTICS. 263

by being selected to make the experiment. I sat in
the centre of the room and held both her hands firmly
in mine. I passed my hands over her arms, without re-
laxing my grasp, so as to feel that she had nothing
secreted there, when suddenly a tambourine, ring, jing-
lers and all, was passed on to my arm. Very remark-
able ; but still not necessarily spiritual. Certain clair-
voyants present said they could witness the ' disintegra-
tion' of the ring. I only felt it pass on to my arm. On
the occasion of my second visit this same feat was
performed on an elderly gentleman, a very confirmed
skeptic indeed. This second circle consisted of twenty
persons, many of them very pronounced disbelievers,
and not a little inclined to be 'chaify.' However all
went on swimmingly.

" After about an hour of rather riotous dark seance,
lights were re-kindled and circles re-arranged for the
Face Seance, which takes place in subdued light. In
the space occupied by the folding doors, between the front
and back room, a large black screen is placed, with an
aperture or peep-hole, about eighteen inches square, cut
in it. The most minute examination of this back room
is allowed, and I took care to lock both doors, leaving
the keys crosswise in the key-hole, so that they could
not be opened from the outside. We then took our
seats in the front room in three or four lines. I myself
occupied the centre of the first row, about four feet from
the screen, Mr. and Mrs. Holmes sitting at a small
table in front of the screen ; the theory being that the
spirits behind collect from their ' emanations ' material
to form the faces. Soon after we were in position a
most ghostly-looking child's face appeared at the aper-
ture, but was not recognized. Several other corpse

264 MYSTIC LONDON.-

like visages followed, with like absence of recognition.
Then came a very old lady's face, quite life-like, and Mrs.
Holmes informed us that the cadaverous, people were
those only recently deceased. The old lady looked
anxiously round as if expecting to be recognized, but
nobody claimed acquaintance. In fact no face was
recognized at my first visit. The next was a jovial Joe
Bagstock kind of face, which peered quite merrily round
our circle ; and, lastly, came a most life-like counte-
nance of an elderly man. This face, which had a strange
leaden ]ook about the eyes, came so close to the orifice
that it actually lifted its grey beard outside. On the
occasion of my second visit, a lady present distinctly
recognized this as the face of her husband, and asked
the form to show its hand as an additional mark of
identity. This request was complied with, the figure
lifting a thin, white, and — as the widow expressed it —
' aristocratic ' hand, and kissing it most politely. I am
bound to say there was less emotion manifested on the
part of the lady than I should have expected under the
circumstances ; and a young man who accompanied
her, and who from the likeness to her must have been
her son, surveyed his resuscitated papa calmly through
a double-barrelled opera-glass. I am not sure that I
am at liberty to give this lady's name ; but, at this
second visit, Mrs. Makdougall Gregory, of 21 Green
Street, Grosvenor Square, positively identified the old
lady above-mentioned as a Scotch lady of title, well
known to her.

" I myself v;as promised that a relation of my own
would appear on a future occasion ; but on neither of
those when I attended did I see anything that would
enable me to test the value of the identifications. The

A SCENE FOR SKEPTICS. 26^

faces, however, were so perfectly life-like, with the soli-
tary exception of a dull, leaden expression in the eye,
that I cannot imagine the possibility of a doubt existing
as to whether they belonged to persons one knew or
not. At all events, here is the opportunity of making
the test. No amount of skepticism is a bar to being
present. The appearances are not limited to a privi-
leged few. All see alike : so that the matter is removed
out of the sphere of ' hallucinations.' Everything is
done in the light, too, as far as the faces are concerned.
So that several not unreasonable test-conditions are ful-
filled in this case, and so far a step made in advance of
previous manifestations.

*' We may well indeed pause — at least, I know I did
— to shake ourselves, and ask whereabouts we are "i Is
this a gigantic imposture ? or are tlie Witch of Endor
and the Cumsan Sibyl revived in the unromantic neigh-
borhood of Marble Arch, and under circumstances that
altogether remove them from the category of the mirac-
ulous ? England will take a good deal of convincing on
this subject, which is evidently one that no amount of
^ involuntary muscular action,' or ' unconscious cerebra-
tion,' will cover. What if the good old-fashioned ghost
be a reality after all, and Cock Lane no region of the
supernatural.

" What then ? Why, one may expect to meet one's
deceased ancestors at any hour of the day or night, pro-
vided there only be a screen for them to ' form ' be-
hind, and a light sufficiently subdued to prevent disin-
tegration; with, of course, the necessary pigeon-hole
for the display of their venerable physiognomies. On
their side of the question, it will be idle to say, ' No rest '
but the grave ! ' for there may not be rest even there.

266 MYSTIC LONDON.

if Delphic priestesses and Ciimsean Sibyls come into
vogue again ; and we may as well omit the letters R. I. P.
from our obituary notices as a purely superfluous form
of speech."

* * * * * *

Speaking now in my own proper person as author, I
may mention — as I have purposely deferred doing up
to this point — that a light was subsequently struck at
Mrs. Holmes's Dark Seances^ and that the discoveries
thus made rendered the seances a final one. Mr. and
Mrs. Holmes retired, first to Brighton, and then to
America.

They were, at the time of my writing, holding suc-
cessful seaiices at the latter place ; and public (Spiritual-
istic) opinion still clings to the belief that Mrs. Holmes
is a genuine medium.

CHAPTER XLH

AN EVENING WITH THE HIGHER SPIRITS.

A T the head of social heresies, and rapidly beginning
"^^ to take rank as a religious heresy as well, I have
no hesitation in placing modern Spiritualism. Those
who associate this latest mystery only with gyrating
articles of furniture, rapping tables, or simpering plan-
chettes, are simply in the abyss of ignorance, and
dangerously underrate the gravity of the subject. The
later development of Spirit Faces and Spirit Forms,
each of which I have examined thoroughly, and made

AN EVENFXG WITH THE HIGHER SPIRITS. 267

the results of my observations public, fail to afford any
adequate idea of the pitch to which the mania — if mania
it be — has attained. To many persons Spiritualism
forms the ultimatum, not only in science, but also in
religion. ' Whatever the Spirits tell them they believe
and do as devoutly as the Protestant obeys his Bible,
the Catholic his Church, or the scientific man follows
up the results of his demonstrations. That is, in fact,
the position they assume. They claim to have attained
in matters of religion to demonstration as clear and
infallible as the philosopher does in pure science. They
say no longer "We believe," but "We know." These
people care little for the vagaries of Dark Circles, or
even the doings of young ladies with " doubles." The
flight of Mrs. Guppy through the air, the elongation of
Mr. Home's braces, the insertion of live coals among
the intricacies of Mr. S. C. Hall's exuberant locks, are
but the ABC which have led them to their present
advanced position. These physical " manifestations "
may do for the neophytes. They are the initiated. I
am the initiated ; or I ought to be, if patience and per-
severance constitute serving an apprenticeship. I have
devoted a good portion of my late life to the study. I
have given up valuable evenings through several con-
secutive winters to dark seances; have had my hair
pulled, my head thumped with paper tubes, and suffered
other indignities at the hands of the " Invisibles ; "
and, worse than all, my friends have looked upon me
as a lunatic for my pains, and if my enemies could
have wrought their will, they would have incarcerated
me as 7to?i compos^ or made an auto-da-fe of me as a
heretic years ago.

Through sheer length of service, then, if on no other

268 MYS TIC L ONDON: .

account, I had grown somewhat blase with the ordinary
run of manifestations. Spirit Faces no longer interest
me j for I seek among them in vain the lineaments of
my departed friends. Spirit Hands I shake as uncon-
cernedly as I do those of my familiar acquaintances at
the club or in the street. I have even cut off a portion
of the veil of Miss Florence Maple, the Aberdeen
Spirit, and gone away with it in my pocket j so that it
was, at all events, a nev/ sensation when I received an
Invitation to be present at a trance seance^ where one of
the Higher Spirits communicated to the assembled
things undreamed of in mundane philosophy. The sit-
ting was a strictly private one ; so I must not mention
names or localities j but this does not matter, as I have
no marvels in the vulgar sense of the word to relate :
only Higher Teachings, which will do just as well with
asterisks or initials as with the names in full.

The scene, thenj'^as an artist's studio at the West
End of London, and the medium a magnetic lady with
whom I had frequently sat before, though not for the
" Higher " teachings. Her instruction had so far come
in the shape of very vigorous raps, which ruined my
knuckles to imitate them, and in levitation of a small
and volatile chess table, which resisted all my efforts to
keep it to the paths of propriety. This lady was not
young j and I confess frankly this was, to my thinking,
an advantage. When I once told a skeptical friend
about Miss Florence Cook's seance, and added, triumph-
antly, " Why, she's a pretty little simple girl of sixteen,"
that clenched the doubts of this Thomas at once, for he
rejoined, "What is there that a pretty little simpleg\x\
of sixteen won't do ? " Miss Showers is sweet sixteen,
too ; and when " Peter " sings through her in a clear

A A' E VENIi\'G WITH THE HIGHER SPIRITS. 269

baritone voice, I cannot, despite myself, help the thought
occasionally flitting across my mind, '' Would that you
■ were six-and-twenty, or, better still, six-and-thirty, instead
of sixteen ! " Without specifying to which of the two
latter classes our present medium belonged, one might
venture to say she had safely passed the former. She
was of that ripe and Rubens-like beauty to which we
could well imagine some " Higher " spirit offering the
golden apple of its approval, however the skittish Paris
of the spheres might incline to sweet sixteen. I had a
short lime before sat infructuously with this lady, when
a distressing contretemps occurred. We were going in
for a dark seance then, and just as we fancied the rev-
enants were about to justify the title, we were startled
by a crash, and on my lighting up, all of the medium I
could see were two ankles protruding from beneath the
table. She had fainted " right off," as the ladies say,
and it required something strong to bring her to. In
fact, we all had a "refresher," I recollect, for sitting is
generally found to be exhausting to the circle as well as
to the medium. On the present occasion, however,
everything was, if not en plein Jour, en plem gaz. There
was a good deal of preliminary difficulty as to the choice
of a chair for the medium. Our artist-friend had a lot
of antique affairs in his studio, no two being alike, and
I was glad to see the lady select a capacious one with
arms to it, from which she would not be likely to topple
off when the spirits took possession. The rest of us sat
in a sort of irregular circle round the room, myself alone
being accommodated with a small table, not for the pur-
poses of turning (I am set down as " too physical ") but
in order to report the utterances of the Higher Spirits.
We were five " assistants " in all — our host, a young lady

2 70 MYSTIC LONDON-.

residing with him, another lady well known as a musical
artiste, with her mamma and my unworthy self. In-
stalled in her comfortable chair, the medium wen:
through a series of facial contortions, most of which
looked the reverse of pleasing, though occasionally she
smiled benignantly par parenthese. I was told — or I
understood it so — that this represented her upward pas-
sage through different spheres. She was performing, in
fact, a sort of spiritualistic "Excelsior." By way of
assimilating our minds to the matter in hand, we dis-
cussed the Apocryphal Gospels, which happened to be
lying on the table j and very soon, without any other
process than the facial contortions having been gone
through, the medium broke silence, and, in measured
tones of considerable benignity, said: "Friends, we
greet you in the name of our Lord and Master. Let us
say the Lord's Prayer."

She then repeated the Lord's Prayer, with consider-
able alterations from the Authorized version, especially,
I noticed, inserting the Swedenborgian expressions,
"the Heavens," "on earth;" but also altering the order
of the clauses, and omitting one altogether. She then
informed us that she was ready to answer questions on
any subject, but that we were not bound to accept any
teaching which she — or let us say they, for it was the
spirits now speaking — might give us. " What did we
wish to know 1 " I always notice that when this ques-
tion is asked at a spirit circle everybody simultaneously
shuts up, as though the desire for knowledge were dried
at its source. Nobody spoke, and I myself was not
prepared with a subject, but I had just been reviewing
a Swedenborgian book, and I softly insinuated " Spir-
itual Marriage." It was graciously accepted ; and cur

AN EVENING WITH THE HIGHER SPIRITS.

271

Sibyl thus delivered herself : — Mankind, the higher
Spirit or Spirits said, was originally created in pairs,
and the soul was still dual. Somehow or other — my
notes are not quite clear how — the parts had got mixed
up, separated, or wrongly sorted. There were, however,
some advantages in this wrong sorting, which was so
frequent an accident of terrestrial marriage, since it was
possible for people to be too much alike — an observa-
tion I fancied I had heard before, or at least not so
profound a one as to need a ghost " Come from the dead
to tell us that, Horatio ! ". When the right halves did
get together on earth the good developed for good, the
evil for evil, until they got to the heavens or the other
places — they were all plurals. Swedenborgianism has
an objection to the singular number; and I could not
fail to identify the teaching of the Higher Spirit at once
with that of the New Jerusalem Church. Two prelim-
inary facts were brought before us ; the Higher Spirits
were in theology Swedenborgian, and in medical prac-
tice homoeopaths. So was the Medium. Although
there was no marriage in the spiritual world, in our
sense of the term, there was not only this re-sorting and
junction of the disunited bivalves, but there were actual
" nuptials " celebrated. We were to be careful and
understand that what terrestrials called marriage celes-
tials named nuptials — it seemed to me rather a distinc-
tion without a difference. There was no need of any
ceremony, but still a ceremony was pleasing and also
significant. I asked if it was true, as I had read in the
Swedenborgian book, that all adult angels were married.
She replied, " Yes ; they married from the age of 18 to
24, and the male was always a few years older than the
female."

272 MYSTIC LONDON,

There was a tendency, which I conthiually had to
check, on the part of the Medium to wander off from
matrimonial to theological subjects ; and the latter,
though trite, were scarcely so heterodox as I expected.
I had found most "spiritualistic " teaching to be purely
Theistic. Love to God and man were declared to be
the great essentials, and creeds to matter little. If a
man loved truth, it was no matter how wild or absurd
his ideas might be. The love of God might seem a
merely abstract idea, but it was not so. To love good-
ness was to love God. The love of the neighbor, in the
sense of loving all one's kind, might seem hard, too ;
but it was not really so. There were in the sphere
where this Intelligence dwelt millions of angels, or good
spirits, working for the salvation of men.

I ought to mention that this lady, in her normal con-
dition, is singularly reticent, and that the "communica-
tions " I chronicle were delivered fluently in one un-
broken chain of what often rose into real eloquence.

So Christ came for the good of man, and Christ was
not the only Messiah who had appeared on earth. In
the millions of ages that had passed over our globe, and
in the other planets of our solar system, there had risen
up "other men filled with the spirit of good, and so
Sons of God." I here tried to get at the views of the
Higher Spirits on the Divinity of Christ, but found con-
siderable haziness j at one time it was roundly asserted,
at another it seemed to me explained away by such ex-
pressions as I have quoted above.

Our planet, I was informed, iiad been made the sub-
ject of special care because we were more material,
more " solid " than the inhabitants of any other orb.
There was an essential difference between Christ and

AN E VENING IVITH THE BIG HEP SPIRITS. 275

all other great teachers, such as Buddha; and there
were no historical records of any other manifestation of
the Messiah than that we possessed ; but such manifes-
tations had taken place.

The Spirit then gave us an account of its surround-
ings, which is, I believe, purely Swedenborgian. The
" celestial " angels were devoted to truth, the " spiritual "
angels to goodness ; and so, too, there were the Homes
of the Satans, M^here falsehoods prevailed, and of the
Devils, where evils predominated.. Spirits from each of
these came to man and held him in equilibrio ; but
gained power as his will inclined towards them. The
will was not altogether free, because affected by inher-
ited tendencies ; but the " determination " was. I have
no idea what the Higher Spirit meant by this ; and I
rather fancy the Higher Spirit was in some doubt itself.
It rather put me in mind of the definition of metaphy-
sics : "If you are talking to me of what you know no-
thing about, and I don't understand a word of what you
are saying — that's metaphysics."

All can do good, continued the Sibyl. Evil can-
not compel you. Utter only such an aspiration as,
" God help me," and it brings a crowd of angels round
you. From those who came to them from this world,
however, they (the Higher Spirits) found that teachers
taught more about what we were to think than what we
were to do. Goodness was so easy. A right belief
made us happier ; but right action was essential.

Pushed by our host, who was rather inclined to
" badger " the Higher Spirit, as to irresistible tenden-
cies, the Intelligence said they were not irresistible.
When we arrived in the Spirit World we should find
everything that had occurred in our lives photographed.

18

274 MYSTIC LONDON.

You will condemn yourselves, it was added. You will
not be '' had up '' before an angry God. You will decide,
in reference to any wrong action, whether you could
help it. Even in the act of doing it a man condemns
himself; much more so there. The doctrine of the
Atonement was summarily disposed of as a " damnable
heresy." " Does the Great Spirit want one man to die ?
It hurts us even to think of it ! "

I then questioned the Medium with regard to the res-
urrection of the body ; and was told that man, as orig-
inally created, was a spiritual being, but had " superin-
duced " his present body of flesh — how he managed it I
did not quite gather. As to possible sublimation of
corporeal integument, the case of ghosts was mentioned.
It was to no purpose. I gently insinuated I had never
seen a ghost, or had the existence of one properly au-
thenticated. I was told that if I fired a pistol through
a ghost only a small particle of dust would remain which
could be swept up. I was not aware that even so much
would remain. Fancy ''sweeping up" a Higher
Spirit I

I could not help once or twice pausing to look round
on this strange preacher and congregation. The com-
fortable-looking lady propped in an arm-chair, and with
an urbane smile discoursing on these tremendous topics,
our little congregation of five, myself writing away for
dear life, the young hostess nursing a weird-looking
black cat; the other young lady continually harking
back to "conjugal" subjects, which seemed to interest
her j the mamma slightly flabbergastered at the rather
revolutionary nature of the communications ; and our
host every now and then throwing in a rude or caustic
remark. I dreaded to think what might have been the

AN EVENING IVI7Y/ THE HIGHER SPIRITS. 275

result of a domiciliary visit paid by a Commissioner in
Lunacy to that particular studio !

Back, then, the musical young lady took us to conju-
gal pairs. It was very difficult to convey to us what
this conjugal love was like. Was it Elective Affinity ?
I asked. Yes ; something like that, but still not that.
It was the spontaneous gravitation in the spheres, either
to other, of the halves of the dual spirit dissociated on
earth. Not at all — again in reply to me — like flirting in
a corner. The two, when walking in the spheres, looked
like one. This conjugal puzzle was too much for us.
We " gave it up ; " and with an eloquent peroration on
the Dynamics of Prayer, the seance concluded.

The Lord's Prayer was again said, with even more
varieties than before ; a few extemporaneous supplica-
tions were added. The process of coming-to seemed
even more disagreeable, if one may judge by facial ex-
pression, than going into the trance. Eventually, to
get back quite to earth, our Sibyl had to be demesmer-
ized by our host, and in a few minutes was partaking of
a ham sandwich and a cup of coffee as though she had
never been in nubibus at all.

What the psychological condition had been I leave
for those more learned than myself to determine. That
some exaltation of the faculties took place was clear.
That the resulting intelligence was of deep practical im-
port, few, I fancy, would aver. Happily my mission is
not to discuss, but to describe ; and so I simply set
down my experience in the same terms in which it was
conveyed to me as " An Evening with the Higher
Spirits."

276

MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER XLIII.

SPIRIT FORMS.

OOME years ago I contributed to the columns of a
^ daily paper an article on Spirit Faces, which was
to me the source of troubles manifold. In the first place,
the inquirers into Spiritualism, whose name I found to
be legion, inundated me with letters, asking me to take
them to the house of pretty Miss Blank, the medium.
Miss Blank might have been going on till now, holding
nightly receptions, without having exhausted her list of
self-invited guests j I had but one answer; the lady was
a comparative stranger to me, and not a professional
medium ; ergo, the legion must ask some one to chap-
erone them elsewhere. Spirit Faces had got compar-
atively common and almost gone out since I wrote. We
are a long way beyond faces now. Then, again, my
second source of trouble was that forthwith, from the
date of my writing, the Spiritualists claimed me for
their own, as Melancholy did the young gentleman in
Gray's elegy. Though I fancied my paper was only a
calm judicial statement of things seen, and I carefully
avoided saying whether I was convinced or not, I found
myself nolens vole?is enrolled among the initiated, and
expected to devote about five evenings out of the seven
to skances. I did go, and do go still to a good many;
so that I feel pretty well posted up in the '' Latest In-
telligence " of the Spiritual world. But the worst of all
is that my own familiar friends, in whom I trusted, have

SPIRIT FORMS. 277

albo lifted up their heels against me — I mean metaphor-
ically, of course. " What's the last new thing in spirits ?"
they ask me out loud in omnibuses or railway carriages,
causing my fellow-travellers to look at me in doubt as to
whether I am a licensed victualler or a necromancer.
As "bigots feign belief till they believe," I really begin
to have some doubts myself as to the state of my con-
victions.

But I wish to make this paper again a simple state-
ment of things heard and seen — especially seen. I
flatter myself the title is a nice, weird, ghostly one,
calculated to make people feel uncomfortable about
the small hours of the morning. Should such be the
case — as they say in prefaces — the utmost hopes of
the writer will be realized. When last I communi-
cated my experiences, the ultimate end we had reached
was the appearance of a white counterpart of pretty
Miss Blank's face at the peep-hole of a corner cup-
board. There were a good many more or less —
generally less — successful imitations of this perform-
ance in various quarters, and the sensation subsided.
Miss B. was still facile princeps from the fact that
she stood full light — I mean her spirit-face did —
whilst all the others leaned to a more or less dim
religious kind of gloom. In a short time, however,
" Katie " — as the familiar of Miss B. was termed —
thought she would be able to " materialize " herself so
far as to present the whole form, if we rearranged
the corner cupboard so as to admit of her doing so.
Accordingly we opened the door, and from it sus-
pended a rug or two, opening in the centre, after the
fashion of a Bedouin Arab's tent, formed a semicircle,
sat, and sang Longfellow's " Footsteps of Angels."

278 MYSTIC LONDON.

Therein occurs the passage : " Then the forms of the
departed enter at the open door." And, lo and behold,
though we had left Miss B. tied and sealed to her
chair, and clad in an ordinary black dress somewhat
voluminous as to the skirts, a tall female figure, draped
classically in white, with bare arms and feet, did enter
at the open door, or rather down the centre from
between the two rugs, and stood statue-like before
us, spoke a few words, and retired ; after which we
entered the Bedouin tent and found pretty Miss B.
with her dress as before, knots and seals secure, and
her boots on ! This was Form No. i, the first I had
ever seen. It looked as material as myself j and on a
subsequent occasion — for I have seen it several times
— we took four very good photographic portraits of it
by magnesium light. The difficulty I still felt, with
the form as with the faces, was that it seemed so
thoroughly material and flesh- and-blood like. Perhaps,
I thought, the authoress of "The Gates Ajar" is right,
and the next condition of things may be more material
than we generally think, even to the extent of ad-
mitting, as she says, pianofortes among its adjuncts.
But I was to see something much more ghostly than
this.

The great fact I notice about spiritualism is, that
it is obeying the occult impetus of all great move-
ments, and steadily going from east to west. From
Hackney and Highbury it gravitates towards Bel-
gravia and Tyburnia. I left the wilds of Hackney
behind, and neared Hyde Park for my next Form. I
must again conceal names and localities; I have no
desire to advertise mediums, or right to betray persons
who have shown me hospitality — and Spirit Forms.

SPIRIT FORMS, 279

We arranged ourselves in a semicircle around the
curtains which separated the small back drawing-room
from the large front one, joined hands, sang until we
were hoarse as crows, and kept our eyes steadily fixed
on an aperture left between the curtains for the faces
to show themselves. The room was in blank dark-
ness, and, feeling rather tired of the incantation, I
looked over my shoulder into the gloom, and lo ! a
shadowy form stood self-illuminated not far from me.
At last I had seen it — a good orthodox ghost in white,
and visible in the darkness. It was the form of the
redoubtable John King himself, who was, I believe, a
bold buccaneer in the flesh, but who looked more like
an Arab sheikh in the spirit. He sailed about the
room, talked to us, and finally disappeared. Eventu-
ally he reappeared behind the curtains, and for a brief
space the portiere was drawn aside, and the spirit
form was seen lighting up the recumbent figure of the
medium, who was stretched on a sofa, apparently in
a deep trance. It must be borne in mind that we
were forming a cordon round the passage from one
room to the other during the whole of this time. A
trio of " spirits " generally puts in an appearance at
these seances. In this case there were John King,
whom I had now seen, as well as heard ; Katie, the
familiar of Miss B. ; and a peculiarly lugubrious gen-
tleman named Peter, who, I fancy, has not been seen,
but who has several times done me the favor of grasping
my hand and hoisting me towards the ceiling, as though
he were going to carry me off bodily to spirit-land. I
stand some six feet in my boots, and have stepped upon
my chair, and still felt the hand coming downwards to
me — where from I have no idea.

28o MYSTIC LONDON.

But my later experiences have still to be told. I
was invited a few weeks ago to a very select seance in-
deed, where the same medium was to officiate. This
family, who spared no expense in their investigations,
had actually got a large, handsome cabinet standing in
their dining room as a recognized piece of furniture.
It was only used, however, on this occasion for the im-
prisonment of the medium. The evolutions of John
King, who soon appeared, all took place outside the
cabinet door. He was only " materialized " to the
middle ; and, to our utter amazement, came up to the
table, and apparently through the table, into the very
middle of the circle, where he disported himself in
various ways, keeping up an animated conversation the
whole time, and frequently throwing himself into the
attitude of a person swimming on his back. He also
went upwards as high as the gasalier, and altogether
did a good many marvellous things, considering that all
this time he presented the appearance of only half a
man illuminated by his own light.

On one occasion only have I been seated next to the
medium during the manifestation of any of these forms.
At this seance I held him firmly by one hand, and a
slightly skeptical lady had the other. We never let go
for a moment, but during the whole of the sitting, while
John King, Katie and Peter were talking, tiny children's
hands were playing with my arm, hands and hair.
■ There were, of course, no children in the room. Peter,
the lugubrious, is great at light porterage. I have
known him to bring a large collection of valuable
Sevres china, and a timepiece, with its glass case — no
easy task in the light, much less in blank darkness.
He also frequently takes down the pictures from the
wall and puts them on the table. Katie winds up a

SPIRIT FORMS. 281

large musical box, and wafts it, wliile pla3ang, all over
the room. Of course we rub our eyes and ask what on
earth, if it be on earth, does this mean ? I have not — to
keep up the diction of my subject — the ghost oi an idea.
If it's conjuring, why don't the mediums say so, and
enter the field openly against Messrs. Maskelyne and
Cooke and Dr. Lynn ? Even if I had a decided opinion
about it I should refrain from propounding it here, be-
cause, in the first place, it would be an impertinence^
and, in the second, no conclusion can be arrived at
upon testimony alone. People must see for themselves
and draw their own inferences. In the meantime the
thing, whatever it is, grows and grows upwards. A year
ago I had to journey down east to find it. Now I must
array myself gorgeously like a Staffordshire miner, and
seek the sahms of the west. The great desideratum^
it still appears to me, is that some man with a name in
science should examine the matter, honestly resolving to
endorse the facts if true, but to expose them merci-
lessly if there be a loophole for suspicion. Omneigno-
tum pro magnifico habetur. I used to think ghosts big
things, but that was before I knew them. I should
think no more of meeting a ghost now than a donkey
on a dark night, and would infinitely sooner tackle a
spirit than a burglar. People's curiosity is roused, and
the sooner somebody gets at the truth the better. It is
a somewhat irksome task, it is true ; but no general
principle can be arrived at, except by an induction of
particulars. Let us be Baconian, even to our ghosts.
If they are ghosts, they are a good deal more substantial
than I had thought. If they are not, let somebody, in
the name of nineteenth-century science, send them off
as with the crow of chanticleer, and let us hear no
more of Spirit Faces or Spirit Forms.

5-52 MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER XLIV.

SITTING WITH A SIBYL.

'^HE connection of modesty with merit is proverbial,
■^ though questioned by Sidney Smith, who says
that their only point in common is the fact that each
begins with an— m. Modesty, however— waiving the
question of accompanying merit— is a trait which, in my
mystic inquiries and devious wanderings, I meet with
far more frequently than might be expected. I have
just met with two instances, which I hasten to put on
record, if only to confute those who say that the age in
general, and spirit mediums in particular, are not prone
to be modest and retiring. My first modest person
was a Spirit Photographer ; my second was a Sibyl. I
might have looked for bashfulness in the latter, but was
certainly surprised to meet with it in the former. J
suddenly learnt from the Medium the fact that a Spirit
Photographer had settled down in my immediate neigh-
borhood, and the appearance of his ghostly advertise-
ment brings to my recollection some previous mystic ex-
periences I myself had in this way.

A now celebrated medium, Mrs. Guppy, 7iee Miss
Nicholl, was, in the days of her maidenhood, a prac-
titioner of photography in Westbourne Grove ; and, as
far as I know, she might have been the means of open-
ing up to the denizens of the Summer Land this new
method of terrestrial operations. Ever on the qui vive
tor anything new in the occult line, I at once interview-

SITTING WITH A SIBYL. 283

ed Miss Nicholl, and sat for my portrait, expecting at
the least to find the attendant spirit of my departed
grandmamma or defunct maiden aunt standing sentinel
over me, as I saw departed relations doing in many
cartes de visite in the room. 1 confess there was a kind
of made-up theatrical-property look about the attendant
spirits which gave one the idea that the superior intelli-
gences must have dressed in a hurry when they sat or
stood for their portraits. They looked, in fact, if it be
not irreverent to say it, rather like so many bundles of
pneumatical rags than respectable domestic ghosts.
However, as long as I got the ghosts, I did not care
about the dress. Temie de soir point de rigueur, I would
have said, as they do outside the cheap casinos in
Paris, or " Evening dress not required," if one must
descend to the vernacular. Well, I sat persistently and
patiently through I am afraid to say how many opera-
tions, and the operator described me as being surround-
ed by spirits — I always am according to Mediums, but
my spirits must be eminently unsociable ones, for they
seldom give me a word, and on this occasion refused to
be " taken " as resolutely as the bashful gentleman in
the Graphic^ who resisted the operations of the prison
officials to obtain a sun-picture of his interesting physi-
ognomy. There was indeed a blotch on one of the
negatives, which I was assured was a spirit. I could
not see things in that light.

Foiled on this particular occasion, my anxiety was
dormant, but never died out. I still longed for a den-
izen of the other world to put in an appearance, and kept
on being photographed over and over again until I
might have been the vainest man alive, on the bare
hope that the artist might be a Medium tnalgre. tui, or

284 MYSTIC LONDON.

undeveloped. 1 had heard there were such beings, but
they never came in my way. I was really serious in this
wish, because I felt if it could be granted, the possibil-
ity of deception being prevented, the objectivity of the
phenomena would be guaranteed. At this time I was
heretical enough to believe that most ghosts were due
to underdone pork or untimely Welsh rare-bits, and that
the raps assigned to their agency were assignable to the
active toes of the Medium which might be anywhere
and up to anything with the opportunities of a dark
seance.

A short time since, however, M. Buguet, a celebrated
French Spirit Photographer came from Paris to London,
and received sitters for the modest sum of 30^-. each.
This would have been much beyond my means j but I
suppose my wish had transpired, and that gentleman
sent me an invitation to sit gratis, which, I need not
say, I thankfully accepted. I felt sure that M. Buguet
did not know either my long-lost grandmother or lament-
ed maiden aunt, so that any portraits I might get from
him would be presumably genuine. I sat ; and over
my manly form, when the negative came to be cleaned,
was a female figure in the act of benediction. I have
no notion how she got there — for I watched every stage
in the operation, and selected my plate myself; but
neither, on the other hand, does she bear the faintest
resemblance to anybody I ever knew.

Still M. Buguet is not my modest photographer.
Elated by success so far, I called on the local gentle-
man who advertised in the Mediiun ; but the local gen-
tleman was " engaged." I wrote to the local gentle-
man appointing an interview ; but the local gentleman
replied not. Yet still his advertisement remains ; and

SITTING WITH A SIBYL. 285

I see in every spiritualistic album dozens of "property"
relations in the shape of quasi-spirits, and wonder why
the local gentleman would not take me, so as to be im-
mortalized in these pages.

Equally modest was the advertising Sibyl. I wrote
to the Sibyl, and somebody replied, and " respectfully
declined." But I was not to be done. There is more
than one Sibyl in the world. I called on No. 2 with-
out announcing my intention or sending in my name.
This Sibyl at once admitted me, and I mounted to
the first floor front of a respectable suburban lodging-
house.

I waited anxiously for a long time, wondering wheth'
er Sibyl was partaking of the onions, whose presence
in that modest domicile was odoriferously evidenced to
my nose, though it was then scarcely half-past one
o'clock. Presently a portly middle-aged man, who might
have been Sibyl's youthful papa, or rather aged hus-
band, entered wiping his mouth. He had clearly been
partaking of the fragrant condiment.

Where was Sibyl 1

" She would be with us directly," the gentleman said,
varying the proceedings by picking his teeth in the in-
terim.

She was with us in a minute, and never, I suppose,
did picturesque anticipations more suddenly collapse
and come to grief than mine. I had pictured Sibyl a
bright ethereal being, and the realization of my ideal
weighed twelve stone, if an ounce. She was a big,
fleshy, large-boned woman of an utterly uncertain age,
not without considerable good- nature in her extensive
features ; but the pervading idea that you had when
you looked at Sibyl was that there was too much of her.

286 MYSTIC LONDON.

I could not help thinking of the husband who said he
did not like a big wife : he preferred two small ones ;
and then again I fell into wonderment as to whether
the man who was still engaged with his dental appara-
tus was Sibyl's husband or papa.

I told them I was anxious to test Sibyl's powers j and,
with a few passes from his fat dumpy hands, the man
soon put her to sleep. It looked to me like an after-
dinner nap, but I was told it was magnetic. It might have
been. By the way, I had unmistakeable evidence from
my olfactory organ that Sibyl had been eating onions.

I had provided myself with two locks of hair, as I
had heard that " psychometry " was among Sibyl's
qualifications. I handed her the first, and she imme-
diately proceeded to describe a series of tableaux which
appeared to pass through her mind. She kept handling
the lock of hair, and said, " The person to whom this
belongs is ill — weak," which was true enough, but might,
I thought, be a shot. I should mention, however, that
it was quite impossible Sibyl could know me. She had
not even heard my name. She then described a bed-
room, with some person— she could not see what per-
son— lying in bed, and a lady in a blue dress bending
over her. This, again, I thought might flow out as a
deduction from her premises of the hair belonging to an
invalid. The blue dress was correct enough, but still
so little special as to be a very possible coincidence.
She then, however, startled me by saying, " I notice
this, that on the table by the bedside, where the bottles
of medicine are standing, milk has been spilt — a large
quantity — and not wiped up." This was a trivial detail,
not known to me at the time, but confirmed on subse-
quent inquiry.

SITTING WITH A SIBYL. 287

She then passed on to describe a second tableau,
where the same person in the blue dress was in a room
all hung ove?' with plates, along with a gentleman whom
she described very accurately. He was the occupant of
the house where the patient lay, and, having a hobby
for old china, had turned his dining-room into a sort of
crockery shop by hanging it all over with the delf.

This was curious enough, though not very convincing.
It seemed as though the influence of this person who
had given me the hair was stronger than that of the hair
itself. With the second lock of hair w^e failed utterly.
She said that also came from a sick person, but a per-
son not sick with the same disease as the other. She
was quite positive they came from different people, and
asked me to feel the difference of texture. I am sorry,
for Sib34's sake, to say they both came from the same
person, and were cut at the same time, though from
different parts of the head, which made one look silkier
than the other.

As a test of Sibyl's clairvoyance, this was not very
satisfactory. She read the inscription on a card when
her eyes were bandaged, pressing it to her forehead ;
but then olden experiences in the way of blindman's
buff convince me that it is very difficult to say when a
person is properly bhnded.

Altogether, then, I never quite got over my previous
disappointment at Sibyl's bulk. Had she been pretty
and frizzle-headed like Miss Annie Eva Fay, or like
Miss Showers or Miss Florence Cook, I might have
been disposed to make more of her coincidences and to
wink at her failures. We are so liable to be led away
by our feelings in these matters. Sib}^ was large, had
eaten onions, and would have been improved if she hac

288 MYSTIC LONDON.

brushed her hair, and so I am afraid I rather grudged
the somewhat exorbitant fee which the fat-handed
man — not Sib}^ — took and pocketed in an interval of
his dental pursuit, and I passed out from that suburban
lodging, none of us, I fancy, very well satisfied with one
another. I have an idea I unconsciously expressed my
inner feelings of disappointment with Sibyl and some-
thing stronger in reference to her male companion.

«(

CHAPTER XLV.

SPIRITUALISrS AND CONJURERS.

T TOW it's done '' is the question which, in the words
-^ -^ of Dr. Lynn, we want to settle with reference to
his own or kindred performances, and, still more, in the
production of the phenomena known as spiritual. I have
spent some years of my existence in a hitherto vain
endeavor to solve the latter problem ; and the farther I
go, the more the mystery seems to deepen. Of late, the
two opposed parties, the Spiritualists and the Conjurers,
have definitely entered the arena, and declared war to
the knife. Each claims to be Moses, and denounces
the others as mere magicians. Mr. Maskelyne holds a
dark seance, professing to expose the spiritualistic ones \
Dr. Lynn brandishes against them his strong right arm
upon which is written in letters all of blood the name
of one's deceased grandmother, while, in return. Dr.
Sexton exposes the conjurers, and spoils one's enjoy-
ment of a hitherto enjoyable evening, by showing " how

SPIRITUALISTS AND CONJURERS. -289

it's done " — how the name of one's departed relative is
forged and painted early in the afternoon, instead of
" coming out " on the spot — and in spots — like measles or
nettle-rash (as we feel defunct relations ought to come) or
walking in and out of the corded box at pleasure, and
even going so far as to give the address of the clever
mechanist down a by-street near Notting-hill Gate who
will make the mysterious packing-case to order in return
for a somewhat heavy " consideration."

I accepted Dr. Lynn's invitation to be present on his
" opening night ; " and wondered, in passing, why every-
body should not make their cards of invitation such
thorough works of art as his. Now I am going to do
even-handed justice all the way round ; and I must say
that Dr. Lynn's experiment of fastening his attendant
to a sort of penitential stool with copper wire, surround-
ed by scrutineers from the audience, and then making
the man's coat come off, and a ring pass over his arm,
behind a simple rug held in front of him, is quite as
wonderful as anything I have ever witnessed at a seance.
It has the great advantage of being done in the light,
instead of, "as in Mr. Fay's case, in darkness, and with-
out a cabinet. In fact, I have no idea how it's done ;
though I have no doubt the first time I see Dr. Sexton
he will point to something unsatisfactory in the bolts to
which that doorkeeper is fastened, and give me the
addresses of the ironmonger who will sell me some like
them, or the tailor who will manufacture me a swallow
tail coat with an imperceptible slit down the back.
Then again, I have, as I said, seen young Mr. Sexton
go in and out of the corded box, and I know how that's
done ; but Dr. Lynn's man goes into three, one inside
the other. Well, I can understand that if Dr. Sexton's

19

290 MYSTIC LONDON.

theory be correct, it may perhaps be as easy to get into
a "nest" of three as into one box ; but how, in the name
of nature — or art — does the nautical gentleman get out
of the double sack in which he is tied ? I cannot bring
myself to print what Dr. Sexton's theory of the box is,
because it appears to be such a wanton cruelty to
" expose " things when people go to the Egyptian Hall
on purpose to be mystified. I remember how the fact
of having seen Dr. Sexton do the trick of reading the
names in the hat spoilt ray enjoyment of Dr. Lynn's ex-
periment. He really appeared quite bungling when I
knew all he was about. He did not, on this occasion,
produce the letters on his arm ; but I saw he could quite
easily have done so, though the doing it would have
been no sort of reproduction of Mr. Foster's manifesta-
tion, who showed you the name of some relative when
you have looked on him quite unexpectedly. I can
quite understand how it is that the spiritualists, who
hold these matters to be sacred as revelation itself — in
fact, to be revelation itself, are shocked at seeing their
convictions denounced as trickery and " exposed " on a
public platform ; but I confess I do not quite see how
they can adopt the tu ^uog'ue principle, and " expose " Dr.
Lynn and Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke as tricksters,
because they do not pretend to be anything else. It
would have been fatal if the magicians had " found out "
Moses, and they wisely refrained from trying ; but it
would have served no purpose for Mos^to " find out "•
the magicians : and it strikes me Moses would have
deemed it very m/ra dig. to make the attempt. The two
things stand on quite different grounds ; and I cannot
help thinking that the spiritualists unwisely concede a
point when they accept the challenge of the conjurers.

SPIRITUALISTS AND CONJURERS. 291

I am quite aware that the theory of the spiritualists makes
of many a conjurer a medium malgre hii, and says he
ought to come out in his true colors. It was so Messrs.
Maskelyne and Cooke were originally introduced to a
London public at the Crystal Palace under the auspices
of an eminent spiritualist ; but it really appears to me
that such an assertion amounts to begging the question j
for I doubt whether it would not " pay ''' quite as well to
come out boldly in Mr. Williams's or Mr. Moses's line
as in that of Dr. Lynn or Mr. Maskelyne.

In a lengthened confab which I once had with Mr.
Maskelyne himself after one of his performances, he
told me that by constant attendance at the seances of
the Davenports he found out how that was all done j
and, being a working watchmaker, was able soon to get
the necessary apparatus constructed. I must again be
just, and state that while the cabinet seance of Messrs.
Maskelyne and Cooke seems to me the exact counter-
part of the Davenports', their dark seance fails to repro-
duce that of the spiritualists as the performances of
Professor .Pepper himself. True, this latter gentleman
does all his exposes on a platform which is sacred
against all intrusion, and Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke
assume to allow as much examination as the spiritual-
ists. But I myself, who have seen Mr. Home float
around Mr. S. C. Hall's drawing-room, and handled
him above and below in transitu^ quite fail to discern
any reproduction of that phenomenon in the heavy,
lumbering levitation of the lady by means of the scis-
sors-like apparatus behind her, which we are only priv-
ileged to behold from the stalls. The dancing walking-
stick is as palpably made terpsichorean by a string as
the chairs I have seen cross Mr. Hall's drawing-room

292 ' MYSTIC LONDON.

in full light were not drawn by strings, for I was able
to look closely at them ; and I do not know how that
was done.

Fresh from Dr. Lynn's really marvellous perform-
ances of recent times, and with Messrs. Maskelyne and
Cooke's equally clever tricks in my mind's eye, though
not quite so recently, I still am bold to say I believe
there are still six of one to half-a-dozen of the other. If
the conjurers reproduce the spiritual phenomena in
some instances, the spiritualists distance the conjurers
in others. I speak of phenomena only. The magicians
produced many of the same phenomena as Moses ; but,
even so, if we are orthodox we must believe the source
of such manifestations to have been utterly different.

But I am, as I said, wise in my generation, and stick
to phenomena. I venture to think the conjurers un-
wise in irritating the spiritualists, who are a growing
body, by placarding their entertainment as exposes^ even
though such announcements may " draw " the non-spir-
itual public. I suppose, however, they understand the
science of advertising better than I do ; but I feel sure
the spiritualists are unwise to follow their example, be-
cause they have got nothing to expose. Dr. Lynn or
Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke are as much pleased as
conscientious mediums would be shocked at being
proved clever tricksters. The only folks who are in-
jured by being told " how it's done," are the British
Public, who pay their five shillings to be mystified at
the Egyptian Hall, just as the spiritualists do in Lamb's
Conduit Street.

If it is to come to a race for the championship — and
seriously it would seem that, having begun, the two
parties are bound to continue the strife — one can scarce-

SPIRITUALISTS AND CONJURERS. 293

ly imagine anything more attractive than such a com-
bined display of talent. Dr. Lynn gets lots of people
to come and see " How it's done " — the gentleman
with the mandolin is well worth a visit, and I cannot
guess how he does it — ^while Messrs. Maskelyne and
Cooke must really be making a good thing of it. Mr.
Williams' seances are decidedly attractive (and how he
does it has puzzled me for years, as I said), nor does
the Progressive Institute seem to decrease in interest;
but let us only picture the fascination of a long eve-
ning where Pepper's Ghost should be pitted against
John King, Mrs. Guppy and Messrs. Maskelyne and
Cooke's lady float in competition round the room or
even in from the suburbs, while the Davenports and
Dr. Lynn's man should wriggle out of or into iron rings
and their own dress coats ! Until some such contest
takes place, the public mind will probably gravitate to-
wards the conjurers rather than the spiritualists, and
that through the actually suicidal policy of the latter ;
because while the spiritualists of necessity can show no
visible source of their manifestations, one of their own
rank devotes himself to aiding the conjurers by show-
ing in reference to their tricks, " How it's done." It
would have been wiser, surely, to stand upon dignity,
and in a truly conservative spirit (is it too late even
now to re-assume it ?) say, " These men are mediums,
but it does not suit their pockets to confess it."

Well, they are signs of the times. London loves to
be mystified, and would only have one instead of mani-
fold methods to be so if the spiritualists and conjurers
were to strike hands, and reduce us all to the dead
level of pure faith or relentless reason and cold com-
mon sense !

294 MYSTIC LONDON.

CHAPTER XLVI.

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM.

TT has been repeatedly urged upon me on previous
occasions, and also during the progress of these
sheets through the press, that I should make a clean
breast of my own belief or disbelief in spiritualism ;
that besides being descriptive, I should go one step be-
yond a mere catalogue of phenomena, and, to some ex-
tent at least, theorize on this mysterious and generally
proscribed subject.

Let me say at the outset that against the proscrip-
tion of this, or indeed any topic which does not offend
against morals, 1 would at the very outset protest as
the height of unwisdom. Thus to taboo a subject is at
once to lend it a factitious interest, and more than half
to endorse its truth : and I believe modern spiritualism
has been very generally treated in this way. Whether
truth has gained by such indiscriminate condemnation
and prejudgment is, I think, greatly open to question.

For myself, I have, from the first, steadily refused to
look upon spiritualism in this bugbear fashion. The
thing was either true or false — or, more probably still,
partly true and partly false : and I must bring to bear
on the discovery of its truth or falsehood, just the same
critical faculties that I should employ on any other
problem of common life. That, I fancy, is no trans-
cendental view of the matter ; but just the plain com-
mon sense way of going to work. It was, at all events,

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 295

right or wrong, the method I adopted to get at such re-
sults as I proceed to make public. I declined to be
scared from the study either by Bogey or my esteemed
friend Mrs. Grundy, but went at it just in the calm
Baconian inductive method in which I should have
commenced any other study or pursuit.

What I want to do is to tabulate these results in the
same order as that in which they occurred to me ; and
here I am met by a preliminary difficulty, not incidental
to this subject only, but common to any narrative where
we have to take a retrospective glance over a number
of years. We are apt to view the subject from our pres-
ent standpoint ; and I shall try to avoid this by quot-
ing, whenever I can, what I published, or committed to
writing, in the course of my investigations. I shall not
cull from others, because I want to make this purely a
personal narrative.

Let me add, too, I do not in the least expect persons
to believe what I say. Some, I think, will regard me as
a harmless ({/"a harmless) lunatic, on account of certain
statements I rnay have to make. Others will consider
the whole thing as decidedly unorthodox and " wrong."
For each of these issues I am prepared. I would not
have believed any one else if they had, prior to my ex-
perience, told me what I am going to tell them here ;
and therefore I do not expect them to believe me. All
T hope to do is to interest persons sufficiently in the
subject to induce them to look into the matter on their
own account ; for verily I believe, as a distinguished
spiritualist once said to me, that this thing is either an
important truth or else one of the biggest swindles ever
palmed off upon humanity.

One word more, and I proceed to my narrative. Of

296 MYSTIC LONDON.

the three aspects under which it is possible to view
spiritualism — the scientific, the theological, and the
social — I shall not touch at all on the first, since I am
not a scientific man ; shall only glance at the second,
because this is not the place for a theological dis-
cussion. I shall confine myself to the third, therefore,
which I call the social aspect \ looking at the subject
as a question of the day, the truth about which we are
as much interested in solving as any other political or
social question, but the investigation of which need not
make us get excited and angry and call one another
bad names. I venture to hope that by these means I
may manage to compile a not unedifying or uninterest-
ing narrative, though our subject be withal somewhat a
ponderous one.

In order, then, to cover the preliminary part of my
narrative, and to let my readers somewhat into the state of
my own mind, when I had looked at the subject for seve-
ral years, I will quote some extracts from a paper I read
before a society of spiritualists at the Beethoven Rooms
a few years ago under the title " Am I a Spiritualist ? "
I may mention that the assembly was divided, and
never decided whether I was or not, and what is more,
I do not think they are quite decided to the present
day. I am a patient investigator still j but I really do
not feel it necessary to issue perpetual bulletins as to
the state of my convictions.

Taking as my thesis, then, the question. Am I a Spir-
itualist ? it will certainly appear, at first sight, I said,
that the person best qualified to answer this question is
precisely the person who puts it ; but a little considera-
tion will, I think, show that the term " Spiritualist " is
one of such wide and somewhat elastic meanins: — in

PI-:OS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 297

fact, that the word varies so widely according to the
persons who use it — that the question may really be
asked of one's self without involving an inconsistency.

When persons ask me, as they often do, with a look
of unmitigated horror, " Is it possible that you, a
clergyman, are a spiritualist? " I am often inclined to
answer, " Yes, madam," — (for it is generally a lady who
puts the question in that particular shajDc) — " I am a
spiritualist, and precisely because I am a clergyman. I
have had to express more than once my unfeigned as-
sent and consent to the Common Prayer Book, and the
Thirty-Nine Articles ; and that involves belief in the
inspiration of all the Bible (except the Apocrypha), and
the whole of that {fiot excepting the Apocrypha) is spir-
itual, or spiritualistic (if you prefer the term) from be-
ginning to end ; and therefore it is not in spite of my
being a clergyman, but because I am a clergyman that I
am such a confirmed spiritualist."

I could answer thus, only I do not, simply because to
do so would be dishonest. I know my questioner is
using the word in an utterly different sense from what
I have thought proper to suppose. Besides such an an-
swer would only lead to argumentation, and the very
form of the question shows me the person who puts it
has made up her mind on this, as probably on most
other subjects ; and when a feminine mind is once
made up (others than ladies have feminine minds on
these subjects) it is very little use trying to alter it. I
never do. I administer some orthodox verbal sedative,
and change the subject. But even accepting the term
in the way I know it is meant to be used — say, for in-
stance, as it comes from the mouth of some conserva-
tive old gentleman, or supposed scientific authority —

^98 MYSTIC LONDON.

one's medical man to wit — " Do you believe in spirit-
ualism ? " meaning " Are you such an ass as to believe
in table-turning, and rapping, and all that kind of non-
sense ? " — even so, the question would admit of being
answered by another question j though I rarely enter
so far on the matter with those whose minds are evi-
dently quite comfortably made up on the matter. It is
such a pity to interfere with cherished opinions. I
have found out that there are Athanasian creeds in
science as well as in theology ; and really, whilst they
form recognized formulae in the one or the other, it
is positively lost labor to go running one's head against
them. The question I want to ask — not the gentle
apothecaries, but my readers — is, What do you mean
by believing in spiritualism ? Many of the phenomena
of spiritualism I cannot but believe, if I am to take my
five senses as my guides in this as in other matters,
and quite setting aside any credence I may give to re-
spectable testimony. When, however, I pass from facts
to theories, and am asked to account for those facts,
then I hesitate. There are some here, I know, who
will say that the spiritualist, like the lady who hesitates,
is lost — who think me as heterodox for doing so, as the
inflexible old ladies and the omniscient apothecaries
did on account of my even deigning to look into the
evidence of such phenomena. I feel really that I have
set myself up like an animated ninepin to be knocked
down by the first thorough-going spiritualist who cares
to bowl at me. But whatever else they think of me —
skeptical though they deem me on subjects where per-
haps you are, many of you, a little prone to dogmatize
— I claim the character at least of an honest skeptic. I
do not altogether disavow the title, but I understand it

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM.

299

to mean " inquirer." I confess myself, after long years
of perfectly unbiassed inquiry, still an investigator — a
skeptic. It is the fashion to abuse St. Thomas because
he sought sensible proofs on a subject which it was
certainly most important to have satisfactorily cleared
up. I never could read the words addressed to him at
all in the light of a rebuke — " Because thou hast seen
thou hast believed." The Church of England treats
the doubt of St. Thomas as permitted by God " for the
more confirm.ation of the faith ; " and I feel sure that
professed spiritualists will not be so inconsistent as to
censure any man for examining long and carefully mat-
ters which they believe to admit of demonstration. I
heard the most eloquent of their advocates say, when
comparing spiritual with credal conviction, " Our motto
no longer is ' I believe,' but * I know.' " Belief may be
instantaneous, but knowledge will be gradual ; and so
it is that, standing at a certain fixed point in very many
years' study of spiritualism, I pause, and — so to say,
empanelling a jury — ask the question it seems I ought
to answer at others' asking — Am I a Spiritualist ?

One word of apology further before entering on the
details of the matter. It will be inevitable that the first
personal pronoun shall recur frequently in the course of
this paper, and that so the paper shall seem egotistical.
The very question itself sounds so. I am not vain
enough to suppose that it matters much to anybody here
whether I am a spiritualist or not, except in so far as I
may be in any sense a representative man. I believe I
am. That is, I believe, nay, am sure, that a great many
persons go as far as I do, and stop where I stop. There
is a largish body of investigators, I believe, dangling
there, like Mahomet's coffin, between heaven and earth,

300 MYSTIC LONDON.

and it would be a charity to land them somewhere. Oi
the clerical mind, I do not claim to be a representative,
because the clerical mind, qua clerical, has made up
itself that the phenomena in question are diabolical.
Of course if I accepted this theory my question would
be utterly irrelevant, and I should claim a place among
the spiritualists at once. The diabolical people not
only accept the phenomena, but admit their spiritual
origin, and more than this, identify the spirits. They
are in point of fact the most thorough-going spiritualists
of all.

In sketching their creed, I have mentioned the three
stages through which most minds must go in this matter.
Some few, indeed, take them by intuition, but most
minds have to plod patiently along the path of inquiry,
as I have done. The first stage is acceptance of the
phenomena, the second the assignment of those phe-
nomena to spirits as their source, the-third is identifica-
tion of these spirits.

I. On the first part of my subject I shall venture to
speak with some boldness. I am not a philosopher,
therefore I can afford to do so. I shall suppose my
five senses to serve my purposes of observation, as they
would be supposed to serve me if I were giving evidence
in a court of justice. If I saw a table move, I shall
say it did move, not " it appeared to move." I do this
in my capacity of a commonplace instead of a philo-
sophical investigator ; and I must say, if I were, as I
supposed myself just now, in the witness-box, with a
good browbeating counsel cross-examining me on this
point, I would rather have to defend the position of the
commonplace inquirer than the philosopher, pledged to
^efend the philosophy of the last fifty years, and bound

• PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 301

hand and foot by his philosophic Athanasian Creed,
and I don't know how many articles, more than thirty-
nine, I fancy.

In the latter part of the year 1856, or beginning of
1857, then, I was residing in Paris, that lively capital
being full of Mr. Home's doings at the Tuileries. At
that time I knew nothing, even of table-turning. I lis-
tened to the stories of Mr. Home and the Emperor as
mere canards. I never stopped to question whether
the matter were true, because I in my omniscience knew
it to be impossible. It is this phase of my experience
that makes me so unwilling to argue with the omnis-
cient people now ; it is such a waste of time. At this
period my brother came to visit me, and he had either
been present himself or knew persons who had been
present at certain seances at Mr. Rymer's. He seemed
staggered, if not convinced, by what he had heard or
seen, and this staggered me too, for he was not exactly
a gullible person and certainly by no means " spiritual."
I was staggered, I own, but then I was omniscient, and
so I did -what is always safest, laughed at the matter.
He suggested that we should try experiments instead of
laughing, and, not being a philosopher, I consented.
We sat at the little round table in our tiny salon, which
soon began to turn, then answered questions, and finally
told us that one of the three, viz., my wife, was a medi-
um, and consequently we could receive communications.
I went to a side table and wrote a question as to the
source of the manifestations, keeping it concealed from
those at the table, and not rejoining them myself. The
answer spelt out by them was — " We, the spirits of the
departed, are permitted thus to appear to men." Again
I wrote — " What object is served by your doing so 1 "

302 MYSTIC LONDON. ^

The answer was — " It may make men believe in God.'*
I have said I am not a philosopher, therefore I do not
mind confessing that I collapsed. I struck my flag at
once as to the impossibility of the matter. At the same
time I did not — as I know many ardent spiritualists will
think I ought — at once swallow the whole thing, theory
and all. I should not have believed if a man had told
me this ; was it to be expected that I should believe a
table ? Honesty is my best policy ; and I had better,
therefore, say I was never so utterly knocked over by
anything that occurred to me in my life before or since.
My visage of utter, blank astonishment is a joke against
me to this hour. We pursued the inquiry almost nightly
during the remainder of my stay in Paris — up to late in
the summer of 1857 that is — and also on our return to
England ; but strangely as it seems to me now, consid-
ering how we began, we did it more as a pastime than
anything else. The only time we were serious was when
my wife and I sat alone, as we often did. Of course
when I came to inquire at all into the matter I was
met by Faraday's theory of involuntary muscular action,
and also with the doctrine of unconscious cerebration —
I was quite ready to accept either. My own position, as
far as I can recall it, then was that the spiritual agency was
" not proven." My wife had great reluctance against
admitting the spiritual theory. I was simply passive ;
but two circumstances seemed to me to militate against
the theories I have mentioned : (i) The table we used
for communicating was a little gimcrack French affair,
the top of which spun round on the slightest provoca-
tion, and no force whatever, not even a philosopher's,
applied to the surface would do more than spin the top
round ; but when the table turned, it turned bodily., legs

PROS AND CONS OF SPIR17UALISM. 303

and all. (2) As to that ponderous difficult theory of
unconscious cerebration communicated by invokmtary
muscular action, whenever we ask any questions as to
the future, we were instantly checked, and told it was
better that the future should not be revealed to us. I
was anxious about a matter in connection with an elec-
tion to an appointment in England, and we asked some
questions as to what form the proceedings would take.
The reply vs^as that certain candidates would be selected
from the main body, and the election made from these.
I thought I had caught the table in an inconsistency,
and said — " There now you have told us something
about the future." It immediately replied — -" No, I
have not ; the matter is already settled in the minds of
the examiners." Whence came that answer ? Certainly
not from our minds, for it took us both by surprise. I
could multiply a hundredfold instances of this kind,
but, of course, to educated spiritualists these are mere A
B C matters ; whilst non-spiritualists would only accept
them on the evidence of their own senses. I do not
mean to say they actually question the facts to the ex-
tent of doubting one's veracity, or else nearly all testi-
mony must go for nothing ; but there is in these matters
always room for doubting whether the narrator has not
been deceived ; and, moreover, even if accepted at sec-
ond-hand, I doubt whether facts so accepted ever be-
come, as it were, assimilated, so as to have any practical
effect.

My facts at all events came at first-hand. I suppose
a man need not be considered credulous for believing
in his own wife, and nearly all these phenomena were
produced by my wife's mediumship. It was not until
late in the year 1865 or early in 1866, that I ever sat

304 MYSTIC LONDON.

with a professional medium. My wife, moreover, from
first to last, has steadily disbelieved the spirit theory, so
that she has not laid herself open to suspicion of being
prejudiced in favor of the subject. She has been
emphatically an involuntary, nay, even unwilling agent
in these matters.

During these eight or nine years the communications
were generally given by automatic writing, though some-
times still by tilting of the table. I am very much tempted
to quote two, which linger in my recollection, principally,
I believe, because they were so destructive of the
cerebration theory, besides being curious in themselves.
I kept no record until a later date. At present all rests
on tradition. Each of these cases occurred in presence
of myself, my wife, and a pupil. In the former, he was
a young Englishman, who had lived a great deal abroad,
whose mother was a Catholic and father a Protestant.
He had been brought up in the latter faith ; and when
I desired him to ask a mental question, he asked, in
French — that being the language most familiar to him —
" Is the Catholic or the Protestant religion the true
one ? " Mark you, he never articulated this, or gave the
least hint that he was asking in French. He did it
in fact, spontaneously. My wife immediately wrote,
" Ta mere est Catholique " so far, in French, with diffi-
culty, and then breaking off into English, " Respect her
faith."

In the second instance, my pupil was a French youth,
a Catholic, who was living in my house, but used to go
to his priest frequently to be prepared for his first com-
munion. One day when we were writing, this youth
asked who the communicating spirit was, and received in
reply the name of Louis D . The name was totally

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 305

unknown to us ; but to our surprise when the youth came
back from his visit to the priest that day he informed us
that his reverend instructor had dwelt strongly on

the virtues of Louis D . Seeing the boy look

amazed as the name which had just been given at our
seance was pronounced, the priest inquired the reason j
and, on being informed, of course directed his catechu-
men never to join in such diablerie again.

The impression, then, left on my mind by these years
of desultory dabbling with — rather than study of — the
subject, was decidedly that the phenomena of spiritualism
was genuine. Looking at the matter from my present
standpoint and frame of mind, it seems to me incredible
that I should have thought so little of the source of the
phenomena. It was, as I said, that I was then dabbling
with, not studying the subject.

But even without advancing beyond this rudimentary
stage, I saw a very serious result produced. I saw men
who literally believed in nothing; and who entered on
this pursuit in a spirit of levity, suddenly staggered with
v^dlat appeared to afford even possibility of demonstra-
tion of another world, and the continued existence of the
spirit after bodily death. I believe a great many persons
who have never felt doubt themselves are unaware of the
extent to which doubt prevails amongst young men
especially ; and I have seen many instances of this doubt
being — if not removed — shaken to its very foundation by
their witnessing the phenomena of spiritualism. " Yes,
but did it make good consistent Christians of them ? "
asks one of my excellent simple-minded objectors. Alas !
my experience does not tell me that good consistent
Christians are so readily made. Does our faith — I
might have asked — make us the good consistent Chris-

3o6 MYSTIC LONDON.

tians it ought to do, and would do perhaps, if we gave
it fair play ?

So, then, my study of spiritualism had been, purely
phenomenal. It was a very sad and serious event which
drove me to look deeper. Some people will, I daresay,
think it strange that I allude to this cause here. The fact
that I do so shows, at all events, that I have looked
seriously at spiritualism since. It was none other than
the loss, under painful circumstances, of one of my
children. Now I had always determined that, in the
event of my losing one near and dear to me, I would put
spiritualism to the test, by trying to communicate with
that one. This will, I think, show that, even then, if I
did not accept the spiritualistic theory, I did not by any
means consider the position untenable. The very day
after my boy's death, I got his mother to sit, and found
she was writing a little loving message purporting to
come from him. This, a skeptic would say, was natural
enough under the circumstances. I said no word, but
sat apart, and kept writing " Who is it that communi-
cates .'' write your name." Suddenly the sentence was
broken off, and the child's name written, though I had
not expressed my wish aloud. This was strange ; but
what followed was stranger still. Of course, so far all
might have been fairly attributed to cerebration — if such
a process exists. It was natural enough, it might be
urged, that the mother, previously schooled in the belief
of the probability of communication, should write in her
lost child's name. For years the same thing never
occurred again ^ though we sat night after night for the
purpose of renewing such communications. I can cer-
tainly say of myself that, at this time, I was a spiritualist
— as thorough and devout a one as any existing ; and

PROS A.YD CONS OF SPIRITUALISM.

307

the fact that I was so, when carried away by my feelings,
makes me the more cautious to test and try myself as to
whether my feelings may not sometimes sway my judg-
ment even now ; whether the wish be not often father of
the thought, at all events in the identification of spiritual
communications, and so, possibly of the spiritual nature
of such communications altogether.

However, from this time — the autumn of 1865 — my
spiritual studies underwent an entire change — they were
studies — serious studies. I now kept a careful journal
of all communications, which journal I continued for
three years, so that I can trace all my fluctuations of
opinion — ^for I did fluctuate — during that period. Now,
too, it was necessary for me to consult those who had
already gone deeply into the subject; and the record of
my experiences would be both imperfect and ungracious
if I did not here acknowledge the prompt kindness of the
two gentlemen to whom I applied — Mr. Benjamin Cole-
man and Mr. Samuel Carter Hall. I was comparatively
a stranger to each of them, but they replied to my in-
quiries with the most ready courtesy, and I am happy to
date my present friendship with each of them from this
time. At Mr. Hall's I met Mr. Home, and on the second
occasion of my doing so, not only saw him float, but
handled him above and below during the whole of the
time he floated round Mr. Hall's drawing-room. I am
unphilosophical enough to say that I entirely credit the
evidence of my senses on that occasion, and am as cer-
tain that Mr. Home was in space for five minutes as I
am of my own existence. The ordinary solution of
cranes and other cumbrous machinery in Mr. Hall's
drawing-room I cannot credit, for I think we should have
seen them, and I am sure I should have felt ropes round

3o8 MYSTIC LONDON.

Mr. Home's body. Chairs went from one end of the
room to the other i?i full light ; and nobody had pre-
viously tumbled over strings and wires, so that I don't
think there could have been any there.

I. fancy, as far as any order is traceable in the some-
what erratic course of spiritualistic experiences, that most
people arrive at spiritualism via mesmerism. It so hap-
pened that this order was exactly inverted in my case.
It was not until 1866 that I found I possessed the power
of magnetism, and moreover, had in my house a subject
whom Alphonse Didier (with whom I afterwards put
myself in communication) declared to be " one in a thou-
sand." Some of the details of this lady's case are very
curious, but this is scarcely the place to dilate upon them
further than as they affected my spiritualistic studies.
She passed with extraordinary ease into the condition
of lucidity, when she was conscious only of basking in
light, anxious to be magnetized more deeply so as to
get more thoroughly into the light, and, moreover, aware
only of the existence of those who had passed away
from earth. She knew they were with her : said I must
know it, as I was there too, and that it was I only who
would not " let her " see them. The fact that " our life
is twofold " was to me most marvellously brought out
by my magnetic treatment of this lady ; and, moreover,
the power of influencing action could not fail to be sug-
gestive of the truth of one of the cardinal doctrines of
spiritualism — that we are thus influenced by disembod-
ied spirits, as I, an embodied spirit, could influence
another spirit in the body. Some of the likes and dis-
likes which I, so to say, produced then in 1866 have
remained to the present hour. For instance, one par-
ticular article of food ( I will not mention what, or it

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 309

would be fatal to my reader's gravity), for which she
previously had a penchant, I rendered so distasteful to
her that the very smell of it now makes her uncomfort-
able. I must plead guilty to having experimented some-
what in this way ; but what a wonderful light it sheds
upon the great problem of the motives of human action !
By the simple exercise of my will I could make my
patient perform actions the most abhorrent to her. For
instance — the ladies will appreciate this power — at a
time when crinolines were extensive, I made that poor
creature draggle about in a costume conspicuous by the
absence of crinoline, and making her look like some of
the ladies out of Noah's ark.

During this period my wife and I constantly sat alone,
and she wrote. It is no disrespect to her to say that
writing is not her forte, but the communications she
made in this way were exceedingly voluminous, and
couched in a particularly happy style, though on subjects
far above the range of ordinary compositions. We
never obtained a single communication purporting to
come from our child, but the position claimed by the
communicating intelligence was that of his spirit-guar-
dian.

Having now probably said enough in these confes-
sions to convince every non-spiritualist that I am insane,
because I believed the evidence of my senses, and even
ventured to look into m.atters so unorthodox and unsci-
entific as mesmerism and spiritualism, I go on to "make
a clean breast," and set myself wrong with the other
moiety of my readers. I must candidly confess that the
experiences of this year (1866) did not confirm my sud-
den conviction of the spiritual agency in these phenom-
ena. I drifted back, in fact, to my previous position,

3IO

MYSTIC LONDON.

accepting the phenomena, but holding the cause an open
question. The preface to the book, " From Matter to
Spirit," exactly expressed— shall I say expresses ? — my
state of mind. There is one passage in that preface
which appears to me to clinch the difficulty — " I am
perfectly convinced that I have both seen and heard, in
a manner which should make unbelief impossible, things
called spiritual, which cannot be taken by a reasonable
being to be capable of explanation by imposture, coin-
cidence, or mistake. So far I feel the ground firm under
me. But when it comes to what is the cause of these
phenomena I find I cannot adopt any explanation which
has yet been suggested. If I were bound to choose
among things which I can conceive, I should say that
there is some sort of action — some sort of combination
of will, intellect, and physical power, which is not that
of any of the human beings present. But thinking it
very likely that the universe may contain a few agencies,
say half a million, gbout which no man knows anything,
I cannot but suspect that a small proportion of these
agencies, say five thousand, may be severally competent
to the production of all the phenomena, or may be quite
up to the task among them. The physical explanations
which I have seen are easy, but miserably insufficient: the
spiritual hypothesis is sufficient but ponderously difficult ^
This statement is natural enough from the scientific side
of the question. Perhaps the theological inquirer, tak-
ing the fact into consideration that Scripture certainly
concedes the spiritual origin of kindred phenomena,
would rather reverse the statement, and say (what I
individually feel) that the psychological explanation is
the ponderously difficult — the pneumatological, the com-
paratively easy one.

PROS AND COiVS OF SPIRITUALISM. 3 j 1

It is now no secret that the author of this excellent
treatise is Professor De Morgan ; and I can only say
that if I am accused of heterodoxy, either from the
spiritualist or anti-spiritualist side of the discussion, I
am not ashamed to be a heretic in such company. Let
me put the matter in the present tense, indicative mood
■ — that is the state of my opinion on the cause of the
phenomena. Admitting the facts, I hold the spiritual
theory to be " not proven," but still to be a hypothesis
deserving our most serious consideration, not only as
being the only one that will cover all the facts, but as
the one I believe invariably given in explanation by the
intelligence that produces the phenomena, even when,
as in our case, all those present are skeptical of or op-
posed to such a theory.

3. It may perhaps sound illogical if, after stating
that I hold the spiritual origin of these phenomena un-
proven, I go on to speak of the identification of the
communicating spirit ; but I hope I have made it clear
that, even if I do not consider the spiritualistic explan-
ation demonstrated, it is still a hypothesis which has
much in its favor.

I have already mentioned the subject of identifica-
tion in the case of the first communication purporting
to come from our little child, and how no such com-
munications were received for a period of some years
after. In December, 1866, I went to the Marshalls',
entering as an entire stranger, and sitting down at the
table. I saw some strong physical manifestations — a
large table being poised in space, in full light, for some
seconds. It was signified there was a spirit present
who wished to communicate, and the message given by
raps to me was — " Will you try to think of us more

3 1 2 ^^y-S riC L ONDON.

than you have done ? " I asked the name, and my
child's was correctly given, though I had not been an-
nounced, and I have no reason to believe my name was
known. The place where he passed away from earth
was also correctly specified. I then asked for my
father, and his name was correctly given, and a mes-
sage added, which I cannot say was equally suggestive
of individuality. It was — " Bright inspiration will dawn
upon your soul, and do not hide your light under a
bushel."

Another case in which I tested individuality strongly,
with utter absence of success, was also brought before
me somewhat earlier in this year. I was sent for by a
lady who had been a member of my congregation, and
who had taken great interest in these questions. She
was suddenly smitten down with mortal disease, and I
remained with her almost to the last — indeed, I believe
her last words were addressed to me, and referred to
this very subject of identification — she consulting me as
to the great problem she was then on the very point of
solving ! As soon as she had gone from us, I went
home, and tried to communicate with her. I was in-
formed that her spirit was present, and yet every detail
as to names, &c., was utterly wrong.

In the spring of the following year I went again to
the Marshalls', in company with one or two other per-
sons, my own object being to see if I could obtain com-
munication from the spirit of a highly-gifted lady who
had recently died — and also, I may mention — had been
the medium of my previous slight acquaintance with
Mr. Coleman. She was very much interested in these
matters, and, when in this world, her great forte had
been writing. She published a volume of poems, which

PI^OS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM.

Z'^Z

won the special commendation of the late Charles
Dickens, and her letters were most characteristic ones.
I mentioned that I wished to communicate with the
spirit 1 was thinking of, and said I should be quite sat-
isfied if the initials were correctly given. Not so — the
whole three names were immediately given in full. I
do not feel at liberty to mention the names ; but the
surname was one that nine out of ten people always
spelt wrongly (just as they do ?7iy name), but on this
occasion it was correctly spelt. I asked for a charac-
teristic message, and received the words, " I am saved,
and will now save others ; " — about as unlike my
friend's ordinary style as possible. It may be said her
nature had undergone revolution, but that was not the
question. The test was that something should be given,
identifying the spirit, by the style of its former writing
while embodied on earth.

With one more case, bearing on this subject of iden-
tity, and bringing the matter up to the present date, I
feel I may advantageously close this portion of my ex-
periences-r-though as I do so, I am thoroughly dissatis-
fied with myself to find how much I have left unsaid.
It is so difficult to put these things on paper, or in any
way to convey them to another ; — most difficult of all
for one unblessed with leisure, and combining in his
single self the pursuits of some three laborious call-
ings.

Last year, whilst sitting at Mrs. B 's, I was

touched by a hand which seemed to me that of a small
girl, and which attracted my attention by the way it
lingered in mine — this would amuse Professor Pepper
— and the pertinacity with which it took off my ring.
However, I never took any steps to identify the owner
of the hand.

314

MYSTIC LONDON.

Some few months ago, my wife and I were sitting,
and a communication came ostensibly from our child.
It was quite unexpected ; and I said^ " I thought you
could not communicate." " I could not before," was
the reply. " But you have not tried me for two years."
This we found was true ; but we actually had to look
into dates to ascertain it. He added, that he always
was present at seances where I went, and especially at

Mrs. B 's. It will, I daresay, sound strange to

non-spiritualists, but the initiated can understand the
conversational tone we adopt. I said, " But, Johnny,
that was not your hand that touched me at Mrs.

B 's. It was too large." The answer was, " No !

it was Charlie's turn." I said, " What do you mean by
Charlie's turn ? " The word was rewritten with almost
petulant haste and remarkable plainness, " Charlie's
twin.'' Charlie is my eldest boy, and his twin-brother
was still-born. He would be between thirteen and
fourteen years of age, and that was precisely the sized
hand I felt. This was curious ; as the event had oc-
curred a year before, and such an explanation had
never even crossed my mind. I was promised that, if

I would go to Mrs. B 's again, each of the children

would come and place a hand in mine. I went to the
ordinary seance some time before Christmas, and was
then told that the test I wished — which I had not then
specified — should be given to me at a private seance.
We had the private seance, but nothing occurred.

Such is my case. To one section of my readers I
shall appear credulous, to another hard of belief. I be-
lieve that I represent the candid inquirer. As for be-
ing scared off from the inquiry by those who call it un-
orthodox, or cry out " fire and brimstone," I should as

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM.

315

little think of heeding them as the omniscient apoth-
ecaries w'lio smile at my believing in mesmerism. If a
man's opinions are worth anything — if he has fought
his way • to those opinions at the bayonet's point — he
will not be scared off from them by the whole bench of
Bishops on the one side, or the College of Surgeons on
the other. Not that I for one moment plead guilty to
heterodoxy, either scientific or theological. I am not,
as I have said several times, a philosopher, but I be-
lieve it is scientific to hold as established what you can
prove by experiment. I don't think my creed contains
a jot or tittle beyond this. And as for theological or-
thodoxy, I simply take my stand upon the Canons of
the Church of England. If all this spiritual business is
delusion, how comes it that No. 72 of the Constitutions
and Canons Ecclesiastical says : " Neither shall any
minister, not licensed, attempt, upon any pretence
whatever, either of possession or obsession, by fasting
or prayer, to cast out any devil or devils t "

The question, however, is not of this kind of ortho-
doxy. It- rather refers to the creed of spiritualism. The
question, in fact, to which I and the many who think
with me pause for a reply, is : — allowing, as we do, some
of the phenomena — but considering the pneumatological
explanation hypothetical only — and therefore any identi-
fication of communicating intelligence impossible — are
we (for I am sincerely tired of that first person singular,
and glad to take refuge in a community), are we, or are
we not, spiritualists ?

So far was I able to commit myself in my address
to the spiritualists of Harley Street. I was, I confess,
greatly pleased when, in 1869, the Dialectical Society
took up this matter, because I felt they were just the

3 1 6 MYSTIC L ONDON.

people to look into it dispassionately. They were bound
to no set of opinions, but regarded everything as an
open question, accepting nothing save as the conclusion
of a logical argument. I joined the Society — straining
ray clerical conscience somewhattodo so — and eventually
formed one of the committee appointed by the Society
to inquire into the matter, and having a sub-committee
sitting at my own house. This, however, broke up sud-
denly, for I found even philosophers were not calm in
their examination of unpalatable facts. One gentleman
who approached the subject with his mind fully made
up, accused the lady medium of playing tricks, and me
of acting showman on the occasion. As there was no
method of shunting this person, I was obliged to break
up my sub-committee. To mention spiritualism to these
omniscient gentlemen is like shaking a red rag at a bull.
As a case in .point (though, of course, I do not credit
these gentlemen with the assumption of omniscience), I
may quote the replies of Professor Huxley and Mr. G.
H. Lewes to the Society's invitation to sit on their
committee : —

" Sir, — I regret thati am unable to accept the invitation
of the Council of the Dialectical Society to co-operate
with a committee for the investigation of ' spiritualism ; '
and for two reasons. In the first place, I have no time
for such an inquiry, which would involve much trouble
and (unless it were unlike all inquiries of that kind I
have known) much annoyance. In the second place, I
take no interest in the subject. The only case of spirit-
ualism ' I have had the opportunity of examining into
for myself, was as gross an imposture as ever came under
my notice. But supposing the phenomena to be genuine
— they do not interest me. If anybody would endow

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM.

317

me with the faculty of listening to the chatter of old
women and curates in the nearest cathedral town, I
should decline the privilege, having better things to
do.

" And if the folk in the spiritual world do not talk
more wisely and sensibly than their friends report them
to do, I put them in the same category.

*' The only good that I can see in a demonstration of
the truth of * spiritualism ' is to furnish an additional
argument against suicide. Better live a crossing-sweeper
than die and be made to talk twaddle by a ' medium '
hired at a guinea a seance.

" I am, Sir, &c.,

" T. H. Huxley.

"29th January, 1869."

Confessedly Professor Huxley only tried one experi-
ment. I cannot help thinking if he had not approached
the subject with a certain amount of prejudice he would
have been content to "Try again." The side-hit at
curates of- course I appreciate !

" Dear Sir, — I shall not be able to attend the investi-
gation of ' spiritualism ; ' and in reference to your ques-
tion about suggestions would only say that the one hint
needful is that all present should distinguish between
facts and inferences from facts. When any man says
that phenomena are produced by 7to known physical
laws, he declares that he knows the laws by which they
are produced.

" Yours, &c.,

" G. H. Lewes

" Tuesday, 2d February, 1869."

3i8 MYSTIC LONDON.

I am not, as I have said, a scientific man, nor do I
advance the slightest pretensions to genius ; therefore I
have no doubt it is some mental defect on my part
which prevents my seeing the force of Mr. G. H. Lewes's
concluding sentence. I have worked at it for years and
am compelled to say I cannot understand it.

I sat, however, through the two years' examination
which the Society gave to the subject ; and it is not
anticipating the conclusion of this chapter to say I was
fully able to concur in the report they subsequently
issued, the gist of which is continued in the final
paragraph :

" In presenting their report, your committee taking
into consideration the high character and great intelli-
gence of many of the witnesses to the more extraordinary
facts, the extent to which their testimony is supported
by the reports of the sub-committees, and absence of
any proof of imposture or delusion as regards a large
portion of the phenomena ; and further, having regard
to the exceptional character of the phenomena, the
large number of persons in every grade of society
and over the whole civilized world who are more
or less influenced by a belief in their supernatural
origin, and to the fact that no philosophical explana-
tion of them has yet been arrived at, deem it incum-
bent upon them to state their conviction that the
subject is worthy of more serious attention and careful
investigation than it has hitherto received."

With those cautiously guarded words I venture to
think that any one who even reads the body of evidence
contained in the Dialectical Society's report will be able
to coincide.

To return to my more personal narrative.

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM.

319

As far as I can trace any order in this somewhat erra-
tic subject, I think I may venture to say that the mani-
festations of the last few years have assumed a more
material form than before. It sounds a little Hibernian
to say so, I know ; but I still retain the expression.
Supposing, for the moment, that the effects were pro-
duced by spirits, the control of the medium for the
production of trance, spirit-voice, automatic writing, or
even communications through raps and tilts of the table
was much more intellectual — less physical than those of
which I now have to speak — namely, the production of
the materialized Spirit Faces and Spirit Forms.

Two phrases of manifestation, I may mention in pass-
ing, I have not seen — namely, the elongation of the
body, and the fire test — ^both, as far as I know, peculiar
to Mr. Home : nor again have I had personal experience
of Mrs. Guppy's aerial transit, or Dr. Monk's nocturnal
flight from Bristol to Swindon. Nothing of the kind has
ever come at all within the sphere of my observation :
therefore I forbear to speak about it.

I shall never forget the delight with which I received
a letter from a gentleman connected with the literature
of spiritualism, informing me that materialized Spirit
Faces had at last been produced in full light, and invit-
ing me to come and see. I was wearied of dark seances^
of fruit and flowers brought to order. John King's talk
wearied me \ and Katie's whispers had become fatally
familiar : so I went in eagerly for the new sensation, and
communicated my results to the world in the two papers
called Spirit Faces and Spirit Forms, the former pub-
lished in Unorthodox London, the latter in Chapter 43
of the present volume. This class of manifestation has
since become very common. I cannot say I ever con-

320

MYSTIC LONDON.

sidered it very satisfactory. I have never discovered
any trickery — and I assure my readers I have kept my
eyes and ears very wide open — but there are in such
manifestations facilities for charlatanism which it is not
pleasant to contemplate. This, let me continually re-
peat, is a purely personal narrative, and I have never
seen any Spirit Face or Form that I could hi the faintest
way recognize. Others, I know, claim to have done so ;
but I speak strictly of what has occurred to myself.
The same has been the case with Spirit Photographs
I have sat, after selecting my own plate and watching
every stage in the process ; and certainly over my form
there has been a shadowy female figure apparently in
the act of benediction ; * but I cannot trace resemblance
to any one I ever saw in the flesh. Perhaps I have been
unfortunate in this respect.

Very similar to Miss Cook's mediumship was that of
Miss Showers ; a young lady whom I have met frequent-
ly at the house of a lady at the West-end of London,
both the medium and her hostess being quite above sus-
picion. In this case, besides the face and full form we
have singing in a clear baritone voice presumably by a
spirit called Peter — who gives himself out as having been
in earth-life, I believe, a not very estimable specimen of
a market-gardner. I am exceedingly puzzled how to
account for these things. I dare not suspect the
medium ; but even granting the truth for the manifesta-
tions, they seemed to me to be of a low class which one
would only come into contact with under protest and for
the sake of evidence.

Mr. Crookes used to explain, and Serjeant Cox still
explains these manifestations as being the products of a
♦ Alluded to ante p. 284.

FEOS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 321

so-called Psychic Force — a term which I below define.
Although I am as little inclined to hero-worshijD, and
care as little for large names as any man living, yet it
is quite impossible not to attach importance to the testi-
mony of these gentlemen ; one so eminent in the scien-
tific world, and privileged to write himself F.R.S., the
other trained to weigh evidence and decide between
balanced probabilities. But it would seem that while
Psychic Force might cover the ground of my earlier ex-
periences, it singularly fails to account for the materi-
alizations, and obliges us to relegate them to the category
of fraud, unless we except them as being what they
profess to be. This I believe Serjeant Cox ruthlessly
does. He claims as we have seen to have " caught "
Miss Showers, and was not, I believe, convinced by Miss
Cook. Mr. Crookes was : and, when we remember that
Mr. Wallace, the eminent naturalist, and Mr. Crom-
well Varley, the electrician, both accept the sjDiritual
theory, it really looks as though the scientific mind was
more open to receive — perhaps driven to receive — this
which I frankly concede to be the only adequate cause
for the effects, while the legal mind still remains hair-
splitting upon conflicting evidence. Whereabouts the
theological mind is I do not quite know — perhaps still
dangling between the opposite poles of Faith and Rea-
son, and dubiously debating with me " Am I a Spiritual-
ist or not 1 "

In a recent pamphlet reprinted from the Quarterly
Journal of Science, Mr. Crookes thus compendiously
sums up the various theories which have been invented
to account for spiritualistic phenomena, and in so doing,
incidently defines his now discarded theory of Psychic
Force which owns Mr. Serjeant Cox for its patron : —

322 MYSTIC LONDON.

First Theory, — The phenomena are all the results of
tricks, clever mechanical arrangements, or legerdemain ;
the mediums are impostors, and the rest of the company
fools.

It is obvious that this theory can only account for a
very small portion of the facts observed. I am willing
to admit that some so-called mediums of whom the pub-
lic have heard much are arrant impostors who have taken
advantage of the public demand for spiritualistic excite-
ment to. fill their purses with easily earned guineas ;
whilst others who have no pecuniary motive for impos-
ture are tempted to cheat, it would seem, solely by a
desire for notoriety.

Second Theory. — The persons at a seance are the vic-
tims of a sort of mania or delusion, and imagine phe-
nomena to occur which have no real objective existence.

Third Theory. — -The whole is the result of conscious
or unccnscious cerebral action.

These two theories are evidently incapable of embrac-
ing more than a small portion of the phenomena, and
they are improbable explanations for even those. They
may be dismissed very briefly,

I now approach the " spiritual " theories. It must be
remembered that the word " spirits" is used in a very
vague sense by the generality of people.

Fourth Theory. — The result of the spirit of the medium,
perhaps in association with the spirits of some or all of
the people present.

Fifth Theory. — ^The actions of evil spirits or devils,
personifying who or what they please, in order to un-
dermine Christianity and ruin men's souls.

Sixth Theory, — The action of a separate order of be-
ings, living on this earth, but invisible and immaterial

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 323

to US. Able, however, occasionally to manifest their
presence ; known in almost all countries and ages as
demons not necessarily bad, gnomes, fairies, kobolds,
elves, goblins, Puck, &c.

Seventh Theory. — The actions of departed human be-
ings— the spiritual theory /^r excellence.

Eight Theory, — {The Psychic Force Theory?) — This is a
necessary adjunct to the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th theories,
rather than a theory by itself.

According to this theory the " medium," or the circle
of people associated together as a whole, is supposed to
possess a force, power, influence, virtue or gift, by means
of which intelligent beings are enabled to produce the
phenomena observed. What these intelligent beings
are is a subject for other theories.

It is obvious that a " medium" possesses a so?nething
which is not possessed by an ordinary being. Give
this something a name. Call it " ■« " if you like. Mr.
Serjeant Cox calls it Psychic Force. There has been
so much misunderstanding on this subject that I think
it best to give the following explanation in Mr. Serjeant
Cox's own words '.^^—

" The Theory of Psychic Force is in itself merely the
recognition of the now almost undisputed fact that under
certain conditions, as yet but imperfectly ascertained,
and without a limited, but as yet undefined, distance
from the bodies of certain persons having a special nerve
organization, a Force operates by which, without mus-
cular contact or connection, action at a distance is caus-
ed, and visible motions and audible sounds are produced
in solid substances. As th^ presence of such an organ-
ization is necessary to the phenomenon, it is reasonably
concluded that the Force does, in some manner as yet

324 MYSTIC LONDON.

unknown, proceed from that organization. As the organ-
ism is itself moved and directed within its structure by
a Force which either is, or is controlled by, the Soul,
Spirit, or Mind (call it what we may) which constitutes
the individual being we term ' the Man,' it is an equally
reasonable conclusion that the Force which causes the
motions beyond the limits of the body is the same Force
that produces motion within the limits of the body.
And, inasmuch as the external force is seen to be often
directed by Intelligence, it is an equally reasonable
conclusion that the directing Intelligence of the external
force is the same Intelligence that directs the Force in-
ternally. This is the force to which the name oiFsychic
Force has been given by me as properly designating a
force which I thus contend to be traced back to the
Soul or Mind of the Man as its source. But I, and all
who adopt this theory of Psychic Force, as being the
agent through which the phenomena are produced, do
not thereby intend to assert that this Psychic Force may
not be sometimes seized and directed by some other
Intelligence than the Mind of the Psychic. The most
ardent spiritualists practically admit the existence of
Psychic Force under the very inappropriate name of
Magnetism (to which it has no affinity whatever), for
they assert that the Spirits of the Dead can only do the
acts attributed to them by using the Magnetism (that is,
the Psychic Force) of the Medium. The difference be-
tween the advocates of Psychic Force and the spiritual-
ists consists in this — that we contend that there is as
yet insufficient proof of any other directing agent than
the Intelligence of the Medium, and no proof whatever
of the agency of Spirits of the Dead \ while the spiritual-
ists hold it as a faith, not demanding further proof, that

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 325

Spirits of the Dead are the sole agents in the production
of all the phenomena. Thus the controversy resolves
itself into a pure question oifact, only to be determined
by a laborious and long continued series of experiments
and an extensive collection of psychological facts, which
should be the first duty of the Psychological Society,
the formation of which is now in progress."

It has frequently struck me, especially in connection
with certain investigations that I have been making dur-
ing the last few years, that Spiritualism is going through
much the same phases as Positivism. It seemed at first
impossible that the Positive Philosophy of Auguste
Comte could culminate in a highly ornate Religion of
Humanity, with its full ritual, its ninefold sacramental
system. It is even curious to notice that it was the
death of Clotilde which brought about the change, by
revealing to him the gap which Philosophy always does
leave between the present and the future. So too
Spiritualism is beginning to " organize " and exhibits
some symptoms of formulating a Creed and Articles of
Belief. -The British National Association of Spiritual-
ists, which has honored me by placing my name on
its Council, thus states its principles, under the mot-
toes : —

" He that answereth a matter before he heareth it, it is
folly and shame unto him." — Proverbs xviii. 13.

" In Scripture we are perpetually reminded that the
Laws of the Spiritual World are, in the highest sense,
Laws of Nature." — Argyll.

" He who asserts that outside of the domain of pure
Mathematics, anything is impossible, lacks a knowledge
of the first principles of Logic." — Arago.

326 MYSTIC LONDON,

DECLARATION OF PRINCIPLES AND PURPOSES.

"Spiritualism implies the recogniticm of an inner
nature in man. It deals with facts concerning that
inner nature, the existence of which has been the subject
of speculation, dispute, and even of denial, amongst
philosophers in all ages ; and in particular, with certain
manifestations of that inner nature which have been ob-
served in persons of peculiar organizations, now called
Mediums or Sensitives, and in ancient times Prophets,
Priests and Seers.

" Spiritualism claims to have established on a firm
scientific basis the immortahty of man, the permanence
of his individuality, and the Open Communion, under suit-
able conditions, of the living with the so-called dead,
and affords grounds for the belief in progressive spiri-
tual states in new spheres of existence.

" Spiritualism furnishes the key to the better under-
standing of all religions, ancient and modern. It
explains the philosophy of Inspiration, and supersedes
the popular notions of the miraculous by the revelation
of hitherto unrecognized laws.

" Spiritualism tends to abrogate exaggerated class
distinctions; to reunite those who are now too often
divided by seemingly conflicting material interests ; to
encourage the co-operation of men and women in
many new spheres ; and to uphold the freedom and
rights of the individual, while maintaining as paramount
the sanctity of family life.

" Finally, the general influence of Spiritualism on the
individual is to inspire him with self-respect, with a love of
justice and truth, with a reverence for Divine law, and with
a sense of harmony between man, the universe, and God.

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 327

" The British National Association of SpirituaHsts is
formed to unite Spiritualists of every variety of opinion,
for their mutal aid and benefit : to promote the study of
Pneumatology and Psychology ; to aid students and in-
quirers in their researches, by placing at their disposal
the means of systematic investigation into the now
recognized facts and phenomena, called Spiritual or
Psychic ; to make known the positive results arrived at
by careful scientific research ; and to direct attention to
the beneficial influence which those results are cal-
culated to exercise upon social relationships and individ-
ual conduct. It is intended to include spiritualists of
every class, whether members of Local and Provincial
Societies or not, and all inquiries into psychological and
kindred phenomena.

" The Association, whilst cordially sympathizing with
the teachings of Jesus Christ, will hold itself entirely aloof
from all dogmatism or finalities, whether religious or phi-
losophical, and will content itself with the establishment
and elucidation of well-attested facts, as the only basis
on which any true religion or philosophy can be built up."

This last clause has, I believe, been modified to suit
certain members of my profession who were a little
staggered by its apparent patronizing of Christianity.
For myself (but then, I am unorthodox) I care little for
these written or printed symbola. Having strained my
conscience to join the Dialecticians, I allow my name,
without compunction, to stand on the Council of the
Association, — and shall be really glad if it does them any
good. The fact is, I care little for formal creeds, but
much for the fruit of those creeds. I stand by that good
old principle — " By their fruits ye shall know them ; "
and that reminds me that to my shreds and patches of

328 MYSTIC LONDON.

*' experience " I am to append some pros and cons of
this matter. They have cropped up incidentally as we
have gone on : but I could with advantage collect them
if my limits admitted of sermonizing.

As to the fruits of Spiritualism, I can only say that I
have never witnessed any of these anti-Christianizing
effects which some persons say arise from a belief in Spirit-
ualism. They simply have not come within the sphere of
my observation, nor do I see any tendency towards
them in the tenets of Spiritualism — rather the reverse.

Then again, to pass from practice to faith, Spiritualism
professes to be the reverse of exclusive. In addressing
the Conference of 1874, and defending my position as a
clerical inquirer, I was able to say : — " On the broad
question of theology I can conceive no single subject
which a clergyman is more bound to examine than that
which purports to be a new revelation, or, at all events,
a large extension of the old ; and which, if its claims be
substantiated, will quite modify our notions as to what
we now call faith. It proposes, in fact, to supply in mat-
ters we have been accustomed to take on trust, some-
thing so like demonstration, that I feel not only at liberty,
but actually bound, whether I like it or not, to look into
the thing.

***#* * **#
Whether your creed is right or wrong is not for me to
tell you ; but it is most important for me that I should
assure myself. And while I recognize that my own
duty clearly is to examine the principles you profess, I
find this to be eminently their characteristic, that they
readily assimilate with those of my own church. I see
nothing revolutionary in them. You have no prop-
aganda. You do not call upon me, as far as I under-

PROS AND CO/VS OF SPIRITUALISM. 329

Stand, to come out of the body I belong to and join
yours, as so many other bodies do ; but you ask me
simply to take your doctrines into my own creed, and
vitalize it by their means. That has always attracted
me powerfully towards you. You are the broadest
Churchmen I find anywhere."

I am not writing thus in any sense as the apologist of
Spiritualism. I am not offering anything like an
Apologia pro vita med in making the inquiries I have
done, am doing, and hope to do. I have elected to
take, and I elect to maintain, a neutral position in this
matter. All I have done is to select from the Pros and
Cons that present themselves to my mind. If the Pros
seem to outweigh the Cons — or via versa — be it so. T
cannot help it. I have scarcely decided for myself yet,
and I am a veteran investigator. Others may be more
speedy in arriving at a conclusion.

Among the more obvious " Cons " are the oft-quoted
facts that some people have lost their heads and wasted
a good deal of their time on Spiritualism. But people
lose their heads by reading classics or mathematics, or
overdoing any one subject however excellent — even
falling in love : and the ingenuity displayed in wasting
time is so manifold that this is an objection that Can
scarcely be urged specially against Spiritualism, though
I own Dark Seances do cut terribly into time.

Then again, one is apt to be taken in by mediums or
even by spirits. Yes ; but this only imposes the or-
dinary obligation of keeping one's eyes open. I know
spiritualists who believe in every medium qua medium,
and others who accept as unwritten gospel the idiotic
utterances of a departed buccaneer or defunct clown :

330

MYSTIC LONDON.

but these people are so purely exceptional as simply to
prove a rule. Do not accept as final in so-called spir-
itual what you would not accept in avowedly mundane
matters. Keep your eyes open and your head cool, and
you will not go far wrong. These are the simple rules
that I have elaborated during my protracted study of
the subject.

" We do not believe, we know," was, as I said, the
proud boast a spiritualist once made to me. And if
the facts — any of the facts — of Spiritualism stand as
facts, there is no doubt that it would form the strongest
possible counterpoise to the materialism of our age. It
presses the method of materiahsm into its service, and
meets the doubter on his own ground of demonstration
— a low ground, perhaps, but a tremendously decisive
one, the very one, perhaps, on which the Battle of
Faith and Reason will have to be fought out.

If — let us not forget that pregnant monosyllable — if
the assumptions of Spiritualism be true, and that we can
only ascertain by personal investigation, I believe the
circumstance would be efficacious in bringing back much
of the old meaning of the word tzigti^ which was some-
thing more than the slipshod Faith standing as its
modern equivalent. It would make it really the sub
stance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not
seen.

Even if the dangers of Spiritualism were much greater
than they are — aye, as great as the diabolical people
themselves make out— I should still think (in the cau-
tious words of the Dialecticians) Spiritualism was worth
looking into, if only on the bare chance, however remote,
of lighting on some such Philosophy as that so beauti-

PROS AND CONS OF SPIRITUALISM. 331

fully sketched by Mr. S. C. Hall in some of the con-
cluding stanzas of his poem " Philosophy," with which I
may fitly conclude —

And those we call " the dead " (who are not dead —
Death was their herald to Celestial Life) —

May soothe the aching heart and weary head
In pain, in toil, in sorrow, and in strife.

That is a part of every natural creed —

Instinctive teaching of another state :
When manacles of earth are loosed and freed —

Which Science vainly strives to dissipate.

In tortuous paths, with prompters blind, we trust
One Guide — to lead us forth and set us free 1

Give us, Lord God I all merciful and just !
The Faith that is but Confidence in Thee !

THE ENIX

HEALTH AND VIGOR

FOR THE BRAIN AND NERVES.

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